S. Simon Jacob: 0:09

Welcome to The Kosher Terroir. I'm Simon Jacob, your host for this episode from Jerusalem. Before we get started, I ask that, wherever you are, please take a moment and pray for the safety of our soldiers and the safe return of all of our hostages. Welcome back to another exciting episode of The Kosher Terroir. Today, I've got something truly special to share with you.

S. Simon Jacob: 0:36

Just a couple of weeks ago, after our Tanat episode, I received a call from none other than Amichai Luria from Shiloh Winery. He invited me to taste two brand new wines that are so fresh they haven't even hit the market yet. We're talking about a single varietal to not and a long-anticipated Pinot Noir from Shiloh's secret reserve line. If you're driving in your car, please focus on the road ahead. If you're relaxing at home, please open a wonderful bottle of kosher wine, sit back, relax and join me as we dive into this exclusive tasting with Itai from the winery and explore the craftsmanship and passion behind these new releases.

S. Simon Jacob: 1:22

You won't want to miss this. So, itai, we're sitting in the Shiloh Visitor Center New Visitor Center, brand new Visitor Center. That's so beautiful, it's absolutely spectacular. And I'm here with my son Ovadia and his wife Leila, and we came specifically because Amichai told us that they had bottled two new special vintages a Pinot Noir that's really special and also the first Tanat, and I did a podcast a few weeks back specifically about Tanat, and I hadn't even known that Amich High was going to make a Tannat.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 2:08

We also didn't know until a few months ago that we're going to release a wine. Tannat wine.

Ovadiah Jacob: 2:16

Yeah, as a variety.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 2:17

We saw it is going to be a part of our blends. Yeah, and most of this batch goes to another blends in the winery.

Ovadiah Jacob: 2:29

Which blend does it go into?

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 2:31

It goes to, also to the Privilege and also because it's make it stronger, and also to the Adino a few drops inside this blend and also to the adeno a few drops inside this land. But we felt that it's really it's not okay to remove it off the table. We need to keep few barrels and make maybe for our experience, just to see how it's going, how it's going to be, what is going to be with that vintage and also how it's going to age. Because of that we did kind of research wine and we're very, very happy of the results. I can say that we upgraded its barrels just a few months before the bottling to make a kind of kick-up to the wine with specific American oak barrels. I was going to ask you what it makes it work.

S. Simon Jacob: 3:44

Yeah, wow, yeah, yeah, wow. Okay, I know it's the most tannic of all the grapes. Yeah, that's out there. But if you make it well, you can reduce the tannic content and it can be really good.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 4:00

I can say that in the first season of the aging, the first part of the aging, we, amchai, actually made the decision to put it in second or third. Use barrels to make the tough tannins, let them low down, because we wanted to lose the tannin levels to see another layer of the wine, because it's like to remove a cover of the when you drink very tannic wine you can't see after. So we made make around plus minus 12 barrels and we just left for the bottling just four. So we have around 1,000 bottles. That's it from this wine, very, very interesting wine, very greeny, like Amichai Amichai, his policy wines. As a winemaker, he likes greeny wines. Not all of the customers like it too, but when you give him the permission to do what he wants and what he likes as a winemaker, he likes it to be green. This is the result. He likes it to be more green.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 5:29

Yeah.

S. Simon Jacob: 5:32

This was actually harvested when.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 5:34

It's harvested 2023.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 5:38

With most of our Secret Reserve wines that we release this summer Also, if we're talking about the Pinot Noir, it's also from that year was a very difficult year because in the middle of the season, the harvest season, 90% of the employees here are left to the war, also me, and it was just Amichai Avinoam, his son, and Aaron, the winemaker, and one second after Simchat Torah, there was here three, just three workers, really workers here, because the other five left to the war Went back into Neluhim, went back into. Yeah, we started to come back just middle of January. Yeah, we started to come back. Wow.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 6:45

So tell me which one should we taste first? Middle of January yeah, we started to come back, Wow. So tell me which one should we taste first. I think we can taste the tannat first, because I think it prepares us to the Pinot Noir, because if the tannat is greeny, the Pinot Noir is extra greeny. Also, with the aromas and the flavor are much, much important. I want you to compare, of course, also the aromas and also the flavor and the color too the color too.

S. Simon Jacob: 7:22

I love it. Pray, pray, pray, pray.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 7:28

As you can see, it's much lighter than the tannin, also because of the grapes.

S. Simon Jacob: 7:36

This is lovely.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 7:38

Yeah, this is great?

S. Simon Jacob: 7:39

I hope so. It's really nice. I hope so. This is really nice, really nice. I can taste it. You know it definitely has the tannins. It has strong tannins, but it's been subdued, it's pretty elegant.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 7:54

The idea behind the switch with the barrels is also to break the sharp corners. If you mean, what? I say with the tannins and with the flavors that we want to clean from this wine. Because of that, in the end of the process we put it in American oak that is a little bit spicy, a spicy oak that when you put it, when you put the wine inside, it's a lot of cases it's breaking sharps, the sharp corners, Sharp corners, yeah.

S. Simon Jacob: 8:38

Sharp edges, edges Right Wow.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 8:44

It's amazing, it's very beautiful and, I think, unique color. If we compare it to another brand in Chilo Winery, it's much deeper red purple. It's deep red purple, yeah.

Ovadiah Jacob: 9:06

You can see on the lips of the wine it's… Phenomenal legs, yeah.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 9:09

Not even sign of oxygen, yeah of oxidation. Yeah.

S. Simon Jacob: 9:17

Yeah, it's beautiful.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 9:23

I'm glad you made this as a varietal.

S. Simon Jacob: 9:27

It's really cool as a varietal, as its own.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 9:31

It's very interesting wine. It's a very interesting grape. The whole process when you're talking about Pinot Noir or Tannat or different varieties of grapes that we made it for the first time, every time is reaching us with an experience with different things, because we know how to make good Cabernet with good grapes of Cabernet and when we give it in, when we're taking another varieties, it's much more complicated because we don't know what to do and how to do it right. I think we've got here a balanced wine, with the tiny dominant acidities, but it's still on the balanced level.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 10:31

Yeah it's definitely balanced, with a medium body, I think, and this is really the tannat's supposed to be, with a medium body and not with full body because, like the tannins, when you taste tannat, if it's with full body or extra tannins, it covers different flavors that you can't get if you leave it like this. When we do a kind of winemaking test, we try to make it like the extreme level of safety of this grape. Because of that, for example, it's for the wine making process that we, every spot on the timeline of this wine, we leave it just with himself. Because when we learn another or new variety, a new grape, we want to see how it's going and if we're gonna blend it with another grapes and other wines, as we're doing all the time. You know, if I want to fix acidity, acidity level, I can mix a few drops of Barbera, for example, to fix it.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 12:02

It's it's it to fix it. It's the best way to fix things at the wine. But here, because we want to learn what we have and what we need to do, we separate it totally. So we keep the tannat away, even if most of the cases we do some blends. Here we wanted to keep it, to keep it out.

S. Simon Jacob: 12:29

And the other one we're tasting is the new Pinot Noir Pinot Noir for the first time 2023.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 12:36

Also, for the first time in Shiloh Winery, these grapes. We never make the harvest of this grape and from the harvest, amichai, of course, worked at the vineyards the few months that before harvest. He made his homework about this grape. When we collected to the winery it was really exciting because is everyone know that Pinot Noir is a elegant, dominant, very legendary grape. Like few cases, when we mess with with with new grape, we want to keep it like the like, like the grape supposed, like the wine is supposed to be. Of course, when we learn a new wine, it's the same way. Like the Tanat, we separate the other wines and we keep it natural. Natural, we try to make the minimum difference. When we make it, to see the real results. It's like a lab test because we want to see how it's going, what it's going to be.

Ovadiah Jacob: 13:53

How did it come out from your perspective Meaning is this what it's supposed to look like? Is this close?

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 13:57

I tell you what before. A few weeks ago, two months ago, we brought here a few winemakers from the area, from Israel, to taste a very, very big Pinot Noir taste. We brought more than 12 brands of Pinot Noir, five from Israel, two of us, two samples of our Pinot Noir with final blend and with good barrels, and also another five brands from Israel, and we tasted it, talked about it. Negotiation also, of course, about the flavors, about the taste, about the aromas. I think our two samples was definitely in the top five and it wasn't the big Pinot Noir they ever tested, but it was a real Pinot Noir and also very surprising aromas. Yeah, the aromas, yeah, the aroma is. One of the winemakers said it's a cannabis aroma.

Ovadiah Jacob: 15:13

Yeah, I don't know that I smell that, but I definitely get totally different aromas than I get from the stronger, fuller body.

S. Simon Jacob: 15:21

Yeah, this is the color you want, want.

Ovadiah Jacob: 15:24

This is the color of pinot noir this is the color.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 15:26

It's a light color, perfect, and because of the color and the body we it was hard decision if, if we can stable it as a security reserve. The Reserve brother Right, because all of the brothers in this edition of the Secretary of the Reserve are at least medium, medium plus body and full colors, strong aromas and very elegant swine also aromas and very elegant wines. Also here is the case that we decided to put inside, to put it in in the Secret Reserve Edition, because it was so special and so elegant wine that we cannot ignore it. We have to put it in the Secret Reserve Edition. It's the first time that we changed the bottle, the glass bottle, in this series, because we're using basically just for the Bordeaux type of the bottle and here we cannot do it.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 16:39

This is a Burgundy bottle. Yeah, it's one of the Bourgogne variety, of course, so we needed to do it. This is a Burgundy bottle. Yeah, it's one of the Bourgogne variety, of course, so we needed to do it. I think it's a very interesting wine, a lot of layers of flavors and when you leave it in the glass for 30 minutes you can feel different flavors.

S. Simon Jacob: 17:00

Very cool.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 17:01

It's really not a Shiloh type wine. It's totally different from everything we did until now. Both of them are, yeah, both of the wines, but the Tannat I can. I can make the connection with.

Ovadiah Jacob: 17:14

The fruit is still.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 17:15

Yeah, it's still very fruity and it's still round, it's still. It's still deep red, it's still with kind of medium body and it's still Shiloh signature, the Pinot Noir. We hope it will be Shiloh signature too, but it's not our regular wines.

Ovadiah Jacob: 17:36

I could taste this without the label and tell you that's a Shiloh wine. So 100% Okay, it's good.

S. Simon Jacob: 17:41

No, but the Pinot is really lovely. Yeah, we're drinking it straight from opening it.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 17:47

So actually, I'm sure it's, I'm sure it's going to and, as we told, it's one of the best variety to to aging, to a long aging, Even in, even if you speak about Israel as a warm country, warm weather, a lot of varieties, a lot of grapes are not supposed to be aging for I don't know decades. But here, as also Shivi Drori, the Gvaot winemaker, told us, it's a good potential. It's a very good potential specific in our Pinot Noir. He tasted also and he said it's with a good potential for aging, for long aging, we hope. Right. Amazing, I can say about the Pinot Noir also, is the decision of the barrels in the process of wine making. The decision about the barrels is, I think, maybe the second big decision which kind of barrels? What is the toasting level with the barrel, if we want full toasting barrels or without the huts the sides. We want full toasting barrels or without the huts the sides? And here we decide to put it in very, very delicate and elegant and low level of toasting because we wanted to see what we have.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 19:20

What we really have, without flavors from the barrels or from another varieties. We want to see the pure Pinot Noir, what we have, and I think the result is very, very interesting, and also pure Pinot Noir because of that.

S. Simon Jacob: 19:39

It's complex. It has a lot of different flavors going on. It's very enjoyable, especially if you let it air a little bit, and it's really beautiful. It's got all sorts of layers in it.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 19:57

It's really good and what I also like in this wine that the aroma is so strong when you taste it.

S. Simon Jacob: 20:07

You are confusing, yeah that's what I was going to say, because it's kind of game.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 20:11

It's kind of game you smell like strong aroma and when you taste it it's tiny, tiny, tiny flavors that you need to research in your mouth. This is one of the big reasons that I like to drink this wine, because it's kind of game. I drink wine all the time, wines all the time, and this game I can say it's a kind of game to smell one thing and taste something different. I very like it and I can find it in other wines also, also with Shida wines and also with different wineries that I tasted. I think this brain game also makes this wine very unique.

Ovadiah Jacob: 21:00

I'm even almost picking up like a mint.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 21:03

Is that?

Ovadiah Jacob: 21:04

right, Mint eucalyptus. Yeah, yeah, eucalyptus.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 21:08

This is the, and when we tasted on the barrels it was stronger and I liked it so much because it's a really different thing. But our winemaker that we talked about with it, amichai himself, also was not so sure that the customers also gonna like it because it's so different than the other.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 21:33

Yeah, maybe it's too much different. So we decided to mix the whole batch together with the barrels and it's made the aroma a little bit lower. It's taken it lower, it's still there, but it was much stronger Overwhelming. Yeah, okay, it's a delightful aroma really.

Ovadiah Jacob: 21:56

Yeah yeah, yeah, you're right, the aroma is powerful. The flavors are subtle, but the aroma is powerful.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 22:02

Yeah, yeah, I think this is one of the brilliant things in this wine.

S. Simon Jacob: 22:07

I like the flavors. The fruit is still there, it's strawberry. It's beautiful fruit and it's very light. It's not a ripe fruit, right, it's much lighter, but it's not like it's diluted. It's not an anemic wine yeah, it's very pronounced fruit and it's just very elegant. It's really nice.

Ovadiah Jacob: 22:30

Do you harvest these grapes at a different point in the maturity cycle, or are they you know?

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 22:35

This vineyard. It's a specific vineyard that came here just for one year Because we asked for a favor from one of our growers. It's to see if we want to Plant, To plant and to buy Pinot Noir. If we didn't know if we like the wine, we didn't know how it's gonna be. We didn't know how it's going to be.

Ovadiah Jacob: 23:06

So what's the mascarna?

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 23:09

I think the mascarna is Good job. We're going to do it. We're going to do it. We definitely want to do it. I think this kind of flavor I can say it's this style of wines are. We're missing it because Shiloh wines known as big bombastic wines, and we want to say that yeah, we know, we know how to make also very elegant, light, but not anemic wines. Pinot Noir is a good example for that.

S. Simon Jacob: 23:49

It's really interesting, it's really, both of these are like a special tour de force of trying to do something new at Shiloh, and it's they're beautifully, beautifully, they're really nicely on the path.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 24:06

I think when Amichai decided to collect new grapes to the winery for our research to make the best wine that we can get, we all the time try to to build ourselves as, as students and not as winemakers that know everything. And when Amichai tries new things, he's not afraid to ask other people and other winemakers and other lab people that know better than him what we need to do, what we're doing wrong, what we're doing right and what we need to do different. I think this point is one of the best things that winemakers can decide to ask other people and not afraid to fail. But nobody want to fail. Fail right, but if you don't ask people that did it before.

S. Simon Jacob: 25:12

Yeah, no, you know I'm going back to this to not now, and the aromas coming off of it are just crazy.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 25:20

It's such a good one, the aromas coming off of it are just crazy, yeah, and before we bottle it, before we decided to bottle it, of course we make full taste of Tanat wines. It was difficult to get, to even get any.

S. Simon Jacob: 25:36

Yeah, I know, there's only a few in.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 25:37

Israel. Yeah, yeah. So we tasted three or four or even five samples of Tannat wines. Two of them was a blend with 90% and above of Tannat wines and Tannat grapes. But it was a very interesting and learning thing to see what the result can be.

S. Simon Jacob: 26:02

I've tasted maybe three tannats and this is really amazing. It's really delicious.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 26:10

I think our mistake was a good mistake to make the decision to put it in in old barrels, basically, and not in new. Because if we put it in new barrels of the start, the start of the beginning of the process, as we actually doing in this level wines I think we was losing a lot of aromas and taste that came out right now. And if we we put it in another style of barrels, I think it was a mistake. It was a mistake. So our real mistake to put it in an old barrel was a successful. A successful. I tasted it one more time and it's different. Now I know it's different. Now the Pinot Noir is different, now Also the Pinot and also the Tanat.

S. Simon Jacob: 27:05

Because they're opening up Now. We drank them very early after we opened them, but now they're.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 27:13

I think it's with the Tanat. I can smell now a kind of nuts aroma. It's stronger now.

Ovadiah Jacob: 27:20

Yes, Well, amichai did say, I think, on your podcast that you're supposed to open it for several days. He said open it up Thursday night or something and drink it throughout Shabbat and by of the lights.

S. Simon Jacob: 27:29

I don't know if he was talking about these two, but yes, you could try that with this easily, easily.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 27:34

You will take these bottles with you and taste it in the evening. I would love to in the day after. They're amazing, yeah, amazing, yeah, thank you. Thank you, no problem, anytime, my pleasure. I think it's gonna be better at the evening. Yeah, take it, taste it and let us know what you think.

S. Simon Jacob: 27:52

Thank you. Thank you for being on the Kosher Terroir. These are not just like picking up a bottle of Cabernet and drinking it. These have such interesting flavors and expressions with them. For a person who wants to taste different wines and is excited about the experience, these are two wines that they definitely have to taste, because it's really different and elegant and lovely and complex. Yeah, the complex, there's so many tastes that you get going on here.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 28:34

It's a wine for wine lovers.

S. Simon Jacob: 28:37

Yeah, it definitely is a wine lover's wine, both of them, it's not a, it's not just for drinking, and also it's not a.

Itay Metzger VP & Winemaker at Shiloh Winery : 28:43

It's. This is not a, it's not just for drinking. I think it's not. Not and also it's not, I think is the better way to taste it. It's not with a meal, it's just. You could tell us this and and you can find along of the taste, you can find different flavors that came out with the oxygen. I think it's what makes it very unique, interesting and wine for wine lovers. Thank you, thank you no-transcript.

S. Simon Jacob: 58:17

This is Simon Jacob, again your host of today's episode of the Kosher Terroir. I have a personal request no matter where you are or where you live, please take a moment to pray for our soldiers' safety and the safe and rapid return of our hostages. Please subscribe via your podcast provider to be informed of our new episodes as they are released. If you're new to the Kosher Terwa, please check out our many past episodes.