Understanding the New Wine Varietal Chambourcin

Chambourcin Grapes at Binah Winery (Photo: The Brand)

Chambourcin is a French American hybrid grape that grows widely in our region, from Virginia and Maryland to Pennsylvania. It is vigorous and disease resistant, and it is an unusual teinturier, a red grape whose flesh is red as well as its skin. My March column in the Wine and Whiskey Globe explains what to expect from it.

Expect medium bodied wines with dark fruit, spice, earth and herbal notes. I focus on Binah Winery's kosher Chambourcin, with dark cherry, plum and spice and a smooth, velvety texture, including the 2020 Reserve, which spent eight months in barrel.

Read the full column in the Wine and Whiskey Globe: Understanding the New Wine Varietal Chambourcin

Elvi Would Have Been Enough For Us

Forty percent of kosher wine sales happen in the months before Passover, and the seasonal reviews always seem to open by announcing that kosher wine is no longer just Manischewitz. My March column in the Wine and Whiskey Globe skips that tired opening and goes straight to one of my favorite producers.

Elvi, the only fully kosher winery in Spain since 1492, makes its flagship wines in Montsant, about an hour from Barcelona, at its Clos Mesorah estate, where it grows Garnacha and Carignan, some from vines more than 80 years old. As the title says, dayenu: Elvi alone would have been enough for us.

Read the full column in the Wine and Whiskey Globe: Elvi Would Have Been Enough For Us