Passover that Wine!
Every spring my family gathers around the table, breaks the middle matzah, opens a bottle of Manischewitz to retells the story of Moses and the Exodus from Egypt. And this year, while I was excited to attend my partner’s family’s seder at Passover, I wanted something a big more exciting. The requirements were: it had to be kosher, and it should be something you’d want to drink four cups of throughout the course of this hours long meal.
As a brief overview, Passover is the Jewish holiday celebrating the Biblical story of the Ancient Israelite escape from slavery in Egypt. It's a big part of Jewish life and history, and far and beyond the most celebrated holiday. Usually there’s a dramatic retelling of the story of Moses with a lot of food traditions including dipping bitter herbs in saltwater to symbolize the tears of the enslaved Israelites, and eating matzah, the unleavened bread they ate during their escape and for the following 40 years wandering the desert. At the seder, you’re supposed to drink four cups of wine to celebrate our freedom 3,000 years later, and as a wine expert, I really wanted to bring some delicious wine to the table to enjoy during the hours long meal.
I got three bottles to bring to my family’s dinner, and I’m really surprised by the selection I found. The first place I went was naturally a website called KosherWine.com (not a sponsor), and their variety was fantastic. There’s two different types of kosher wine: mevushal and non-mevushal. Mevushal means “cooked” or “boiled” in Hebrew, and is flash pasturized which removes a lot of the flavor and is meant more for mixed company. This is the pre-conceived idea of what kosher wine is: dry, astringent, thin, and something you endure rather than enjoy. Non-mevushal wine is only different from regular wine in the sense that only religiously observant Jews are involved in the wine making process from growing to bottling, and thus tends to be of a more palatable quality than mevushal. This specific type I would say is the subtle minority of kosher wine, something that can be enjoyable, and even collectible for the special moments gathered with your family celebrating time spent together. Neither is better or worse than the other, and even I enjoy a small glass of Manischewitz at the end of a meal. But this is all to say, that in the grand scheme of things, the world of wine is wide, and even in the niche of kosher wine, there’s a scale of quality that doesn’t just stop at table wine.
My haul from kosherwine.com
Now, onto the wines I chose. I wanted three bottles, as per the headcount of the meal. Four glasses per person multiplied by the ten people at our table would be forty cups more or less. Now, given that we were required to consume four glasses, we weren’t intent on pouring full 8 ounce pours each time, or even half that amount. But there still needed to be enough that we weren’t required to get up and hunt for more bottles the later the evening went. One of the other guests and I split the duties of providing the wine, and interestingly they decided to go for mevushal wines from Israel. Both bottles were cabernet sauvignon, and while they were leaps and bounds further in quality from what I expected, they were still lacking in a way. Even though great pains are taken to ensure the wines are only hot for so long, and have ample time to cool down quickly, the koshering process for mevushal wines does take away from the overall structural composition of the wine. It was deeply appreciated, and I was grateful to have a contrast to the bottles I chose, stylistically speaking.
Of the three bottles I picked, I started with a 2021 Eola-Amity Hills Pinot Noir from Oregon, which I was only able to find available from KosherWine.com. At $31.99 a bottle, I wasn’t sure quite what to expect from this wine, as I’ve had wines both under and over that price tag that have been a range of qualities. As big fan a pinot noir, and the region of Willamette Valley, I was really excited because I chose it specifically for my mother, who loves a dry, earthy pinot. I figured this would be a beautiful wine to start the evening with. Something with fresh red fruit flavors, and lovely earthy notes to complement the apple and date charoset eaten to symbolize the mortar the Egyptians commanded the Ancient Israelites make. It’s a sweet dish made savory with the addition of homemade horseradish atop matzah as a little sandwich to start the meal, the perfect thing to pair with a light bodied pinot noir. This wine didn’t disappoint: light bodied, dry, with notable red fruit flavors, light notes of oak, it was a textbook pinot noir. It was balanced, but it did have a shorter finish and was quite simple. However, I’ll kindly attribute that to being the latest vintage release and nothing more.
Next, I had a beautifully chilled bottle of 2021 Dry Riesling from the Finger Lakes in Upstate New York from Sheldrake Point. I chose this entirely because of the matzo ball soup my partner’s father makes twice a year. It’s so rich and delicious and eating it is the highlight of my year. The salty chicken broth seasoned with lemon and dill was just screaming for a crisp, acidic riesling to make it sing. This was my personal favorite bottle out of my selection as it was not only easy to drink, but reminded me a lot of some beautiful German rieslings from the Mosel with its limestone notes and long, bright finish.
And lastly, as a wine connoisseur, I had to bring something French to the table. My partner's family very proudly drinks California wines almost exclusively, so whenever I get the opportunity to broaden their horizons, I do. Seeing this beautiful bottle of 2015 Crozes-Hermitage was available, I had to leap at it. One of my favorite occasion wines, it brings a certain elegance to a Syrah from the Rhône through soft, integrated tannins, and fantastic notes of age like smoked meat flavors perfect for a brisket. The brisket served at our seder was lovingly dry rubbed then smoked for 8 hours before being served. It's the only red meat I eat with any regularity, and it's certainly an occasion eating it. It was only right it be served with a bottle of wine that highlighted its' best features and left you completely satisfied at the end.
And as fantastic as the wine is, it's nothing if you're lacking for good company. Intentionally taking time off to spend with my family, laughing at annual jokes like the way my partner's brother holds the dog on his lap imitating the funny faces the Boston Terrier makes back at him, is priceless. The wine, as always, is the current running through the evening, never the star of the show, but a constant central feature. It's one of the least memorable parts of the evening, especially by the end of this exhausting meal when you're more stuffed than a Thanksgiving turkey. But getting to express my love for my family through the bottles I choose for them to enjoy brings me joy. After all, isn't that what life is all about?