Part 5: Winery visit - Wine & Cheese for Breakfast

T'was an early start to the day. The plan was for us to join in the early morning harvesting of grapes but that ended too early at 5.30am so we missed it. However, we still made it through a series of bumps and dirt road to the vineyards and Tabor Winery, where I had my life's first wine and cheese for breakfast. :)

But that only came after a visit to the vineyard. Michal, a 15-year veteran viticulturalist, emphasized the use of technology in Israel's agriculture sector and gave us an introduction into the 15 grape varieties produced there. 

Vineyard:

According to Israeli law, grapes cannot be harvested for the first 3 years so the 5-year old vineyard is harvesting some grapes varieties for the very first time! They also need a suitable diurnal range (15 deg Celsius here) and are experimenting with many varieties.

Tabor Winery:

We then drove through the dirt road to Tabor Winery, one of the largest producers of wine in Israel (now owned by Coca-Cola). In order to produce Kosher wine (read more about what makes food Kosher here), only Orthodox Jews are allowed to touch the equipment so all of us had to be extra careful not to step on even the thin wires along the floor. We can only touch the bottle after it is corked. :) 

There are 20 different wines produced here and we got a chance to taste 5 of them.

• 2011 Sauvignon Blanc - their flagship wine
• Petite Syrah
• Syrah Cabernet - very young, only bottled 2.5 months ago
• Pure Cabernet 
• Pomegranate wine - from pomegranates, not grapes - and one of my favorites!

So lucky to be here!

Click here to read Part 1 , Part 2 , Part 3 and Part 4 of the trip.

Foodprinted on 4 September 2012, Tuesday