Spreading Israeli Wine Globally w/ Victor Schoenfeld & Walter Whyte, Golan Heights Winery

Hey listeners, just want to let you know that we've released the latest compilation of show notes in book form, covering episodes from 2022 to 2023. It's full of insights on sustainability, marketing, and even has a few celebrity sightings. Pick what up on Amazon and support the show. Welcome to X-Shadow. The podcast that navigates the business of wine with unique perspectives and insights with your host Robert Vernick and Peter Young. Welcome to this episode of X-Shadow. Today we're going to talk about bringing Israeli wine to the world. And we have Victor Schoenfeld, head wine maker of Golden Heights Winery and Walter White, the VP of Sales of Yarden Wine Imports. Welcome to the show guys. Thank you. Thank you. It's great to be here. Would you mind giving our listeners a brief overview of your backgrounds? Maybe Victor, we can start with you? Okay. I am a graduate of fermentation science they called it at that time. From UC Davis, I grew up in Southern California and a far suburb of Los Angeles on the beautiful Pacific coast. And I decided at some point that I'd like to be a farmer and I always loved food. But when I got interested in farming, the only thing that really stood out, flavor wise, was wine grapes. So I actually started at UC Santa Cruz. My studies transferred to Davis for viticulture at that time. You either studied viticulture or a analogy. It wasn't yet unified. Then I started studying viticulture and understood that was just the beginning of the wine making process. So I had to change my major and my fourth year to fermentation science at that time for wine making. Then I was recruited in 1991 to come replace the previous wine maker at Golden Heights Winery, the legendary Jim Klein of Navarro Vineyards where he's been many years since then. And I took over on January 1st 1992 and I'm in charge of overseeing the wine growing and the wine making at the Winery ever since. Wow. So where exactly in Southern California? Just to the curiosity. Race called Palis Verde, a peninsula. Oh yeah. Okay. I know where that is. That's where the Terranair resort is. Yeah. Well, it used to be a marine land that that's where we did our summer jobs at marine land. Okay. And somehow they attracted you to go all the way to Israel. So I hadn't been in Israel before. Actually during my studies, I saw this advertisement to come be a vineyard manager in Israel. So I took a year off from Davis and when I managed to vineyard for a year in Israel. So they actually found me. There weren't many wine makers with some Israel connection. So I initially came over on a three year contract. When I got there in 1991, the winery was eight years old. And I was to become the sixth wine maker because there were no Israeli wine makers at the time. Wow. It's crazy. And you've been there for gosh, what is that? 30 plus years. Yeah. One of the luckiest things that ever happened to me. Wow. Walter, what about you? So I've been involved in sales and marketing on the adult beverage industry for a long time. 20 plus years probably closer to 25 years. I grew up in the wine hotbed of New Jersey and ended up that during high school worked about the only job that the high school kid could work at the time, which was in restaurants. So I kind of, you know, my interest kept peaked on wines. I joined the military directly after high school and ended up spending four of my six years in Europe and at the opportunity to go visit to classic wine growing regions of the world. And I thought that I had a job in the military that no longer exists. It's a civilian job now, but I managed the NCO clubs and the officers clubs on base. So I got to meet people that traveled around the world and talk to people about wine. And I thought, wow, that is a really cool job. When I got out of the military, I figured, you know, I'm young full of gusto kid and I'm going to go right into that and I learned really quickly you don't, you know, started off at the lowest tier of the local distributor level carrying a bag. And I'm just kind of over the course of the years progressed up through the ranks. I've worked with domestic wineries. I've worked with importers, of course, South America. And I've worked in pretty much all different channels of the industry. I've done the supplier side. I've done the distributor side. I've done the on premise side. And here I am today working with wines of Israel and go on heights. Sounds like you both have deep backgrounds. So for context, where exactly is golden heights winery and basics like how big is it? What kind of wines you make? So, you know, Israel is on the eastern Mediterranean and the goal on heights, if you look at a map of Israel is the kind of the air shaped appendage in the northeast. So it's volcanic plateau. So 100% volcanic soils, high elevation vineyards, classic Mediterranean climate, or on the 33rd parallel like San Diego. So we need to go up in elevation to get cooler climate. And the winery is in the small town of Ketstrin, which is smack dab in the middle of the goal on heights. So from the winery, it's about a 30-minute drive to our southern goal on lower elevation vineyards at 1200 feet and a half hour drive in the opposite direction to our high elevation northern goal on vineyards at close to 4000 feet in elevation. So what kind of wines you make there? So because of that tremendous range of elevations, we actually have found that we can grow an astonishing number of varieties successfully. So we're currently harvesting this last harvest. We harvested 19 different varieties, but we're known around the world and we sell our wines, I guess we'll get to this later, but we sell our wines broadly around the world. But we're well known for our sparkling wines, our traditional methods, sparkling wines. Yarden, Cabernet is probably the number one most iconic is fairly wine that exists. And we make a range of whites, reds, and some also dessert wines. So it's really an unusual region that in a quite a small area, you can successfully grow so many varieties and make so many styles of wine successfully. And you have a range of price points. We'll talk about later your ultra premium releases or your super high in ones, but what is the lowest price wines that you make? Actually, just let me touch on what Victor said regarding varietals. I've worked domestic wineries, imported wineries, all wineries that I've worked for, all wineries that I've ever encountered in my career. They're known for one to maybe, maybe three varietals. It seems that everything that's in the ground at the Golden Eights winery is just, it's superb. For years, we consulted with the legendary California wine maker, Zalm Alon. And she often said she didn't know of any other wine producer that made so many different wine styles at the quality level that we do. So it is really quite unusual to get to your question regarding pricing. We have something for everyone. Our entry levels, called the entry levels, our mountain or among series is available in the in the $15 price range. This is US dollars I'm referring to. We go from the $15 price range. Our premium Yardan series is depending on the varietal, Averna, retails for about $50 a bottle. Then you get into the super premiums, $80. I know we'll touch on the cruirley, which is kind of not a regular everyday offering, but we run anywhere from $15 up to $2000 for a two bottle set of the cruirley. Yeah, that's quite the range. And so do you grow your own grapes or are there growers that you source through from? So we directly manage close to 40% of our vineyards. And we have this strategic plan going forward and we see that number going up. The rest of the vineyards are long term contracts. So we don't buy or sell fruit normally if a certain lot of wine because we work directly with our vineyard blocks. So we work with over 500 individual vineyard blocks. And each one of those is managed separately harvested separately, venefied separately. So if a particular lot doesn't come up to our, well, we would consider minimum quality standards. We'll sell out that wine, but we don't normally sell our bike grapes. Got it. And probably most of our listeners aren't really that familiar with wine growing in Israel. So what's the history and sort of terroir of why making an Israel and in the Golden Heights? So a big article came out in the journal science in 2023. They did a huge study of bittersvenifera genetics. And they determined that there were two domestication events simultaneously 11,000 years ago. So one in the Caucasus and one in western Asia, which is us. So we don't know how long wine production has gone on in our area before recorded history. But there's a lot of archaeological evidence of wine production and what's now Israel, including in the Golden Heights. There's been over 30 ancient wine presses found and identified in the Golden Heights. In terms of terroir, I don't think you can talk about Israeli terroir just because even though we're such a small. country 5% the size of California, place the size of Los Angeles County, or in Los Angeles at the moment, for that's why I have Los Angeles County in my head. But within that area we have, you know, most of the country is desert in the south, and then a lot of the country is Mediterranean climate, and we're the coolest region in Israel, so we have classic Mediterranean climate. The northern golan gets the same amount of annual rainfall as London, but we get it in the Mediterranean climate way, which means it all comes in winter. So we have warm, dry days with wind in the afternoons in the summer, which is great because it's low disease pressure, and then cold wet nights, which is exactly what lines love that diurnal difference. And then I would say if you look at a map of Israel, you can easily see where Mediterranean climate is if you look at a rainfall map, basically everywhere where there's more than 350 millimeters, that's about 7-14 inches, which is a classic kind of minimum annual rainfall for Mediterranean climate. If you look at that and then you look at an elevation map, so high elevation areas within the Mediterranean climate zone, that's where most of the high quality Israeli winds are being made these days. And in modern why-making and viticulture in Israel are there sort of dominant grape varieties that are most popular, or you know, is it Israel known for something, or is it as diverse as Golanites as? Yeah, because our area was came under Muslim rule in 738, and was under Muslim rule continuously until the end of World War I, all the old varieties mostly died out. The varieties that survived were good for table grapes. So they're vitis beneficial, but they're good for eating large large berries, soft skins, not very concentrated in flavor. So there is work being done in Israel to investigate those varieties. In fact, the professor who's doing that work, most of that work, has told me the largest collection of varieties that they found was in the Golan Heights, where they've surveyed. So we're definitely not the first people to be making wine, but there are some ones also being made in desert conditions, but you know, with my experience, I think, in a way very hot areas and very cold areas have a similarity because the growing season is short. So in very cold areas, the growing season is short because fall and winter come, and there hasn't been that much heat accumulation. In very hot areas, the season is short because it just becomes too hot, and the vine basically shuts down. But in like our mid-range, which is our beautiful Mediterranean climate, the vines just are naturally come to this exquisite level of ripeness. And are there any sort of like indigenous or native varieties to Israel? So there are some, again, they're the ones that we're good for eating. So none of there's a very few. There's Marawi and a couple of others. You know, they're interesting. I don't personally think they're very impressive yet, but I think the history, once we get those varieties sorted out, I think it will be interesting in the kind of the medium-long term. But the international, so-called international varieties that we work with, which were Vittis vanifera, the difference between, because we're normally lumped into the new world in the wine world. So we're the only new world wine producer that, where Vittis vanifera is our indigenous species. So we're actually growing our indigenous species. These varieties came by later, but I think that's an interesting difference between us and other new world countries. Do people still consider Georgia old world then, I guess? Because that's the other place, right? That's got the deep history. Yeah, so apparently the, I mean, this guy that was doing the research on finding the Israeli varieties, he says what they found so far that our varieties seem to be a little bit older than those Georgian varieties. But if these dual domestication events 11,000 years ago, I guess the origin was about the same time. And then from our area, everything traveled west into Europe. And so it's early February 2025 as we're recording this. There was just a ceasefire, fortunately, between Hamas and Israel. But it, over the last few years, Israel has been a geopolitical hotbed all around the country. And you're in the north east, I guess, do you border Lebanon then? No, we border Syria. Syria, okay. But has that war or whatever you call the conflict impacted, grape growing and winemaking for you guys? Luckily, minimally, we have another winery, the Goliol Mountain Wainery that our winery is two thirds of, which is on the Lebanese border, so they were much more impacted also in terms of vineyards getting destroyed by secondary fire from missiles falling. We had a missile fall in one of our vineyards and the northern Golan didn't do much damage, limited damage, you know, emotionally for everybody, it's been a very tough more than a year. So it's hard to say that we haven't been impacted, but we were able to continue working pretty much routinely. That's great. And maybe this is both for both of you, but where is the market these days for Israeli wine? Is it domestic or export primarily? So the wineer was actually founded to make wine to export. So it was the first winery founded in Israel with the express desire to express the goal of making high quality wine. That was 1983, our first vintage, so that was kind of a new thing. And in fact, the large domestic co-op at the time blocked the sale of the our wines at the beginning and at the very beginning was only for export for that reason. But today there's demand generally outstrips the supply, how much we can make. So there is a lot of demand for our wines in our domestic market in Israel. So this year we were a bit above 26% export, but we see our production expanding about 30% by 2030. And we see most of that expansion, if not all of it going to export. Got it. And Walter and the US were the main markets for Israeli wine. As far as the US goes, and actually just to go back to what Victor said, with the winery being founded in 1983, the Israeli wine industry, people over here in the year, you typically recognize it as the pre-Golin Heights era and the post-Golin Heights era. When Golan Heights was introduced as a winery in 1983, they totally changed the game of winemaking. You always had, you had wine there in Israel, but it was ceremonial wine or it was table wine and Golan Heights Israel then became a real premium wine producer. And before we get the American market, I mentioned all around the world, but next month I'll be going to Japan for instance, for my 13th time because that's one of our major markets. So it's kind of interesting for me to come to the United States and where there's in some of areas in the US, there's this well-established kosher market and that we have to battle a little bit to get at it. But for instance in Japan we're just marketed on the high end of the market. Angelo Gaia distributes our wines in Italy again just on the high end of the market. So broadly that's our goal is just to market our wines. It's high quality Israeli wines around the world. Yeah and as far as the US goes, driving markets for us, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, that whole Northeast corridor going up into Massachusetts, Florida, Texas, Illinois, California, Arizona is starting to generate some decent business for us. We see Yard and Wine imports, I think we're on our 18th year here. And typically the majority of what we brought into the US went to the religious markets. A big part of what I was brought on to do was to expand that outside into the secular market. We've seen really good things happen with some major chains across the country, i.e. Total Wine, Binnies, accounts like that. So we're seeing the introduction or the expansion of these wines into the non-religious market and that's where they should be. This week working the market, I remember years ago, I was like, yeah, we have some Israeli wines that we've been making wine in Israel. And now it's like, oh, Israeli wines, yeah, I've been meaning to, we were at a wine bar and the song was saying, yeah, I've been meaning to do a class about Israeli wine or, oh, cool Israeli wine. So one day in Orange County we got into this nice wine bar. We got into this nice tasting menu restaurant and it's the first time either of them will be serving Israeli wines. So people seem to be really open, accepting, and really interested and excited about it. I definitely want to circle back to religious versus secular. But first talking about the export markets, what are your top five export markets? The US is going to be, I mean, the US will be the number one export market. It's probably, I would imagine you Europe. You know, Europe is closely behind that. The major export markets right now, US, Canada, the European market, and Far East. And you mentioned that only 26% of your productions exported today, that means 74% is consumed domestically in Israel. How big in mature is the wine culture in Israel? Our per capita consumption is frustratingly low. But you know, we have a large segment in the population that doesn't have a gaukall for religious reasons. It's a very diverse population. But the culinary scene is when I moved to Israel, I was living the last one I worked at was in Champagne in France before coming to the Golan H2. But before that, I was living Glen Ellen in the Sonoma Valley and the biggest shock about moving to the winery in Israel was the lack of good restaurants. And even in Tel Aviv at that time there were like four restaurants that were considered good restaurants. And I think some of those were so-so. But the culinary scene in Tel Aviv now is amazing. I do have a gripe sometimes that a lot of these high-end restaurants in Tel Aviv seems to seem like they feel more sophisticated if they concentrate on imported wines instead of domestic wines. And in fact, I've heard complaints from Israeli tourists, you know, "Oh, we came to Israel." The food was amazing, but it was sometimes hard to find Israeli wines on the winelists of these great restaurants. So that's something that I think we need to work on. So I don't know if that's a mature marker in or an immature market. I think moving and being more prideful of your, or more proud of your own domestic product, I think. I think when California wines also came up, it took a while for them to be taken seriously in the American market. And so I think maybe we're in that phase in Israel at the moment. Yeah, you have to, I guess, have a reputation globally for the top sommelier's to want to serve you even in your home country, I guess. So, well, it was really funny last month that we were visiting Gaia who distributes us in Italy and they're like, "Oh, your Pino is so wonderful. We would love to get more of your Pino." You know, produce that much. And, you know, some domestic sommelier's are like, "Pino know how can you even think of growing Pino? You're not burgundy." And, yeah, we're not trying to be burgundy either. We're trying to get an authentic local expression of the variety. So, yeah. Which is what it's known for. Why it's grown all over the place. So, on that note, how do you try to differentiate both Israeli wine and Golan Heights wine from the rest of the international wine stage? From a sales and marketing perspective in North America, I think, you know, I like to say that we are the oldest new world winery in existence, you know, just based on how long production, you know, there's been wine production in that region. You know, I'll go back to what I said earlier in our conversation about the fact that the winery does so many varietals so well. For us, it is, we're at a grassroots stage right now where it's old school. We're putting the wine in front of people, letting the people taste the wine and they recognize the quality and they also recognize the value it represents as well. Using our Yardan Cabernet as an example, you know, that wine retails for under $50 a bottle and I am confident and comfortable putting that wine up against Cabernet's two, three times that price from around the world. So, right now, you know, it's grassroots marketing, it's almost gorilla marketing, getting the wine in front of as many people as we can. Wine making viewpoint, you know, when I came in 1991 and I took over the beginning of 1992, the winery had been making some nice wines. So, there was obviously potential, but I think the one thing that becomes clearer, more and more clear over time, is the almost insane potential that there is in the Golden Heights. And I don't know, even after I've been ahead and why I make it there for 32 years, but I still feel like we're scratching the surface. So from the wine growing and wine making viewpoint, first of all, there's no other region in the world that combines, you know, high elevation and Mediterranean climate, volcanic soils, all in the 33rd parallel. One of a sommelier said, "What about Mount Etna?" And that's on the 30th. That's what I was thinking. That's on the 37th parallel, if I'm not mistaken. So there's a significant difference in day length as we go, you know, between seasons. So, I think it is a unique region of the Golden Heights, you know, in an international sense. So our mission is to figure out how to grow wines and make grow wines that get a lot of expression of fruit with being as minimally interventional as possible and then to make wines that make sense. So even within the last five years, we've completely rethought our irrigation, philosophy and strategy, resulting in more vinear blocks that are dry-farmed, serious reduction, I think, close to 2/3 probably, reduction in water use and an increase in wine quality. So our goal is when people taste our wines, they don't think, "Wow, these are great wine growers or wine makers, we want them to think, wow, the Golden Heights is an incredible place to make wine." So it's still evolving and we're still exploring and researching. Yeah, and I think this is where your diversity can help and hurt you at the same time because there's nothing for consumers to hang their hat on to say, "Oh, the Golden Heights is Brinosh or Cabernet or whatever, right, in terms of associating quality wine with something a specific type or style of wine?" Yeah, it is a challenge. We still grow some Vioñe. I don't think it was unusually because normally I don't say this, but I don't think it was a very successful variety in the goal. I mean, it was okay. So we will soon, within the next couple years, have no Vioñe and I don't have any plans of planning more of it. On the other hand, so many of our varieties do well. So in that case, your den Cabernet is iconic and we could sell a lot more and because that means we should only make that, it's kind of a philosophical question. And it depends on the region. If you have other people in your region also making great Cabernet, then like, "Okay, your region, you can establish the quality of the region," or if you are distinct in your area, you want to establish the reputation of Golden Heights winery, right? And maybe that's what you're trying to do with the new super high-end release, which we'll talk about soon. Years ago, we won a trophy for our sparkling wine, the best bottle for men in sparkling wine worldwide. We won the best wine producer in Italy one year. We won the best Chardonnay in the world a few years ago at the Citadel de Monde wine competition in Bordeaux. Of course, the Yardin Cabernet has been in the top 100 wines of the year of wine spectator three times. So I don't feel like I've come to the conclusion that we don't have to limit ourselves to something. Also, our single Viennere program, our consumers have come to know that we don't make every single Viennere every year. So it depends on, you know, the results of that specific vintage. And so every year it'll be, the selection will be a bit different. And as a wine maker, it's really freeing. Also, you know, the amount of Yardin Cabernet, it doesn't matter what our plans are, post-arvest we see how much wine we have at different qualities, and we'll make it as much as we can, but it doesn't matter what the plan was before that. So there's the, we're really focused as a winery on wine quality and our whole goal is to produce value. So that's where most of our research and development goes. That's where our, as we expand, we're going to be more directly managing the use of ourselves because we see that's where the better results are. So as a wine maker, and I have a team of wine makers and viticulturists and wine growers, I mean, it's a hub a lot more fun too. So it's nice one fun and profitability go hand in hand. So going back to secular versus religious a little bit here, Jewish people generally, and this is a global statement, tend to have a strong affinity for Israel. Does that extend to Israeli wines as well? Absolutely. I'll speak to North America on this. We saw after the events of October 7th, 2023, just an outpouring of people wanting to do anything that they could do to support Israel, and naturally that in certain markets that gravitate towards Israeli wines, Israeli products. We have a very strong presence in kosher wine stores here in the US, but you know, just due to our efforts over the past few years to market to the secular market. We now have people that identify as Jewish, but maybe they're not religious. They're Jewish, but not necessarily religious. They're venturing into the secular markets. And they, I mean, they're almost ambassadors for us as a winery, for the Israeli wine industry in general, because they're asking these secular stores to Please bring these in, these are great wines. I haven't met a retailer that says no to a customer if it results in money in their register. For sure. In that religious space, is there pathways, a path or pathways that you've been able to market to Jewish people effectively? We participate in whether it's local, regional, national. We are active in Jewish organizations. We'll advertise in Jewish publications and things like that. We participate in tastings that are sponsored by and/or focused on the Jewish population. That's been one of the most effective ROI methods. The reception that we get is always top notch reception that we get the recognition that we get. They know who we are. We do see a general increase in business following participation in events. Whether it's marketing, blitzes, or in person tastings, things of that nature. Some of the geopolitics of Israel are not viewed favorably by other places or other people. Does that impact the market for Israeli wine at all, do you think? It seems so this year in Europe. We had declining sales in Europe this year. We've seen in the past, things relax and we get past it. The sales recover. Hopefully that'll be the. But in the US, we actually saw increased sales and that offset the decreased sales in Europe. Domestic sales are always strong. Globally, I don't think we felt like it had much of an impact, but in specific markets. Certain pockets usually centered around maybe institutes of higher learning, things of that nature. We saw it, but overall just because our plan for the entire country was so strong and executed so well, the setbacks that we did see in the handful of markets didn't really affect our business. And we market here in North America. I market in this order. World class wine from Israel. And yeah, it's kosher as well. I'm selling on the merits of the wine as opposed to where the wine is coming from. So on the last part are all your wines kosher? They are. And just for people who aren't familiar with what that is, how is the process to make the wine kosher different from any other wine? Broadly, there's two types of kosher wine. So most of the kosher wine produced in the world as a designation called Mavushal or Mavushal in Hebrew meaning cooked. And so if you do it to minimize the damage to the wine, it's pastrized, so it's heated up very quickly and cooled down. But in my personal opinion, you're minimizing damage. You're doing it for religious reasons. And that's because some of the kosher market requires the wine to be Mavushal, especially kosher restaurants. So we don't do any of that because we're quality focused. So we actually like went to kosher market. We forego the American kosher restaurant market because we're not willing to make any wines that go into that classification. So our wines are certified that nothing non kosher is used in the wine making. So everything that we use in the wine maker has to be wine making has to be certified kosher. So things like wine yeast, it's very easy. And so we have a lot of, if we want to use the yeast, there's a lot of different things we can use. You know, there's isems last, which is a fish protein isolated from sturgeon, which is a non kosher fish. We can't use that, but that's fine. I wouldn't use it anyway. So it's on the wine making side, there's almost, there's no difference in the process. Visited some kosher wineries or wineries with kosher production, like in Spain before and other places, they have to have different people. I guess do that. It just doesn't matter in Israel, I guess, because everyone's. Yeah, so in Israel, we're not making kosher wine in a non kosher wine facility. So here the whole facility is kosher because the wines of course are kosher pass over. You're not allowed to bring like a sandwich, but that bread is not kosher for passage or so. So you can't walk around with a sandwich in your hand in our production areas. There's no food allowed in that area. And your wines are they still been able to be used for religious events, even though they're not pasteurized? Yeah, so there's no limitation, like for home use, or it's just, it's basically that kind of restaurant situation. And just do you guys have a sense of how big the market for kosher wines are for religious versus non-religious uses, or I guess for the two types of pasteurized versus non-passurized? So mavushal versus non-mavushal, I think that would probably be a question that would be. I mean, with the production looks like for you know, Israeli wineries. I mean, we don't deal with kind of the low end of the market, but all the catering weddings or mitzvahs, all those kinds of things that happen at a venue that's basically a restaurant, that's all mavushal. So I think it's only the kosher wine producers that are trying to make an exceptional product that will make some of their wines non-mavushal. So that's a big difference. A lot of the wineries will do both. But our philosophy, even on our more basic wines, we still want a product that we have tried to make the best possible no compromises. So we're still not even willing to do it even though, you know, when I travel in the American market, especially, yeah, in the American market often, get requests to make, you know, if you guys made mavushal, we could sell a lot more. And I said, yeah, or maybe that's true, but it's not going to happen. So we could double our business overnight here in the US if the winery were to do mavushal wine. But then we would not be the same thing. Exactly. I'll stick with the quality over the quantity. Got it. And so for your wines and maybe for the Jewish or Israeli market, are there favorite sort of food and wine pairings for your wines? Traditional Middle Eastern cuisine is a little bit of a tough nut in terms of wine pairings because the traditional way to serve food is to serve a lot of dishes, a mezzae or whatever, a lot of different flavors all at the same time. And so it's not the classic European course after course and you can like zero in on this wine in this course kind of thing. So, but in fine dining, even Israeli fine dining is a little bit like that. But the well-known Somalia Joshua Wesson once I heard him speak once and he said, anything that beer goes well with sparkling wine goes well with. And I thought that was a good out-sourage. Running that way. Yeah, you're a smart guy. Running that goes perfectly. But, you know, I think the average consumer doesn't put a lot of thought into food and wine pairings, you know, the foretacking. So whatever people like is good. It's funny. You'll see certain varietals of ours, our Gerverstrimean or pop-up in Asian restaurants, which I always get a kick out of. It has nothing to do with anything besides the fact that that is a quality Gerverstrimeaner and someone appreciated that enough to bring it into the store knowing that it's being sold as a world-class wine. We have a lot of Yardan Cabernet in traditional steak houses. So the pairings, there's not really, you don't really see too many specific pairings that would relate directly to Israel. You see pairings that are more in tune with the varietals themselves. I can tell you when I've gone to Japan in the past, you know, most of the wine in Japan is sold in restaurants anyway, it's sold in Italian restaurants, French restaurants, even though everything gets Japanified there, so it's whatever, but it's this incredible hybrid. But the last time I was there, there was a lot of excitement around our Pino Gris because we visited some Japanese cuisine restaurants that were serving the Pino Gris and they were talking about how well that integrates with Japanese cuisine. So that's fun. We, yeah, on the Drega Verstrimeaner. We also do, on the entry level, we do a Mascotto. It's about 6% alcohol. It's got a little frisante in it and bartenders have started using that as a base for cocktails, wine-based cocktails. He doesn't like to hear this, but you know what, in some, it's interesting. It's not a traditional way that you would serve the wine, but they've really, you know, they've gotten interested in it and they've used it for other than intended purposes with good results, I think. So there's no bestseller for a traditional Passover dinner or anything like that, I guess? No, actually Passover dinner has this built-in courses to it a bit. So actually there, it's a bit easier. But yeah, it's a big sales because you have to have four glasses of wine, unfortunately, or grape juice, which I think is a travesty, but whatever. So that's a big, Yeah, passovers are big sales time. Could be non-alcoholic wine these days, I guess. more as bad as being produced. That's a whole nother podcast. So you recently released Yard & Crew Elite for the wineries 40th anniversary and that's as we mentioned earlier $2,000 for a pair of wine, only 265 pairs were made. What drove the launch of this wine and how do you see it evolving going forward? I mean the idea was to do something to celebrate the wineries 40th anniversary and a lot of our wine gets sold up by collectors. So to give those enthusiasts to collect or something to enjoy but not many people realize the kind of resolution that we normally work in. I mean not only vineyards but vineyard blocks and I mentioned before maybe that we work with over 500 individual vineyard blocks which are all managed. Carvested I still make the decision about when to harvest each one of those blocks, vinified separately. So we work at this insane resolution level and so we do give our consumers a chance to like Cabernet. They can compare all an Abishon Cabernet to El Rome Cabernet to Barone Vineyard Cabernet and that's a lot of fun but this one a step further so this pair they're both Cabernet from Barone Vineyard but each one it's so it's a single vineyard, single varietal, single vineyard, single block, each one of them comes from a specific block of vineyards and single barrel. So we just racked one barrel from each and filled the wine so it's an expression that unless you bought that pair nobody's normally see and they're you know they're there similarities but they're also distinctly different those wines even though they come from quite close to each other so each vineyard block is you know it's like fingerprints everything even if we wanted to we couldn't make them exactly the same and we don't want to make them exactly the same. So they got an enthusiastic reception we actually released those in an Israeli restaurant in Singapore. Yeah, cool and you mentioned that those are sold mostly to collectors. Do you have a direct relationship with those collectors or is it going through your wholesale partners like like Yardin? So these and NFT was also included with each pair so it had to be carefully managed so these were sold directly by the winery and also we didn't agree to sell more than one to a single individual although you know you can have your friends buy wine but so we tried to spread it around as much as possible and even a couple weeks ago the CEO of Soft Bendo of the winery said he intentionally also held a bit back because he didn't want it all to go out once. So what are you most excited about for Golan Heights winery over the next two to three or the next 40 years? So like I said we've even within the five years of revamped our irrigation philosophy. So it's been actually an incredible time to be a winemaker because over the years I've been a winemaker we've had these new tools come online and so with each new tool we've been able to learn more but then everything you learn also comes with mysteries or questions, additional questions so the quest never ends. So right now the last few years we've been working with Sapflow which is a tool to actually measure the amount of liquid that's flowing through the vine and that gives us a whole different perspective of what's going on with the vine. I mean in general from when I came here until now when I came to the winery there were vines with big canopies and little root systems and now we have vines of little canopies and very deep and very big root systems and I think that's really been successful but again this process of discovery in the Golan Heights is never slowed. So I think we want to continue kind of this trend to let the vine do its thing with minimal intervention. So I think we've progressed but there's a lot more to go and planting vineyards that will outlive us. So the you know I'm very unusually for a wine producer we have two propagation vineyards in our own nursery so the vines that we plant are vines that we've actually produced ourselves and that's to in order to plant high quality disease-free vines because diseases like all over the world have been in problem in Israel as well. So I hope now we're planting vines that the next generation maybe the next couple of generations will be enjoying the fruits of what we're planting. So in our I mean I would say our wine growing philosophy is generational wine growing. So the decisions that we make today aren't you know for this season they're not for the next couple years. The decisions that we make on an ongoing basis especially in the vineyard because that's you know outside but also in the winery I would say or have to be correct decisions for the generations to come. So we'd like to wrap up each episode on a personal note. For each of you what is your most cherished bottle wine in your cellar? Doesn't have to be the wine or cellar and when do you plan on drinking it? So I am I'm a victim of wine not lasting long in my household. I've been trying to get better at it recently but I do have a bottle in my house that I don't know when I'll drink it. It's a 1971 range and the way that I acquired it my godfather was Australian. About 15 years ago my parents were moving from one house to another house. I was in the wine business of course and but I was also their son and they needed help. So my brother and I went over helped them move and I came across this bottle of range and it was tucked away in my father had a liquor cabinet where it was just dry shack. My father was not a drinker but he always he had things there for when he entertained and in the back of this closet was this bottle of 1971 range and I said where did you get this? And he said oh he said I forgot that was back there. He said Kenny that was my godfather. He said Kenny gave this to us. It was for one of my birthdays or something like that. My birth year was 1971. He was my godfather. He was Australian and he gave it to my parents to pass on to me. So I finally acquired the bottle last year. I don't even know. I've looked it up. They say that it may have hit its prime in 2016 but I'm going to hold out. Did you get a record? I want to penfold the sessions? No, I have not. Victor what about you? Well part of the magic of our wine room at home is that it's a zoo. So there's bottles in there that I don't even know they're there because I tell my wife it's her job to get it organized but she doesn't buy that. I don't even know how many bottles we have in there. I would guess 1500 maybe. Bottles of wine. So there's some prized wines of our own but there's you know I have a Vegas Hesilia Unico back there. I have some old chav back there. Some old chateau de baux Castell. Some old california wines from having california wine making friends. So I don't know. Also within our own wines I never I can never choose a favorite but the wine is a good question. My wife keeps telling me we have to open up more wine. We're not going to live long enough to drink all the wine. I hope she's wrong but I'm willing to open up any bottle we have. Nothing is for collecting. It's all to drink at some point. There you go. It's a good philosophy. Well thank you both for sharing all your insights with us and for teaching us about Israeli wine and the Golden Heights winery. Thank you. Thank you for having us. Yeah it was a pleasure. Thanks for joining us. If you loved this episode of X Chateau we'd love for you to subscribe, rate and give a review on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast until next time. Cheers!