There has been a lot of talk and comments on kosher wine lately, but generally there still persists quite some confusion, and many people, including professionals from the very same wine sector, ignore the term and its meaning.

What does “kosher wine” mean?

Kosher is a Hebrew term and means “pure”; it is thus a wine which is apt to be consumed by followers of the Jewish religion, which establishes a series of regulations in the kashrut of the Torah. Its adequacy is determined by a certificate awarded by certain agencies, of which there are some three hundred all over the world.

The only difference between a kosher wine and other wines really lies in the fact that all stages of the process of production in the winery are carried out by practicing Jews, and that all products employed during this process are kosher, too.

There are two categories: if the wine has been pasteurised, it qualifies as mevushal, and may be handled by non-Jews, even though it will descend to a category of a lesser product of wine. If only Jews have intervened in its production, the wine qualifies as passover, and is therefore apt to be opened at Pesach, the most important Jewish religious festivity. It is these wines that are most interesting.

Besides Jewish consumers, kosher wines are also attracting an increasing number of aficionados all over the world, who consider them to warrant a sort of guarantee as to natural and rigorous elaboration of the wine.

Being kosher is like being biodynamic, or ecological, it opens the doors to export markets, and this is one of the reasons why, especially during the last decade, there have been appearing brands with this certification from all the main wine-producing regions in Spain

A stroll through the Vineyards of Sepharad

The mid-nineties saw the launch of kosher wines in Spain, with the cooperative Capçanes, in Tarragona, starting to produce its Peraj Ha’abib, considered one of the best kosher wines in the world.

During the last decade, more wineries and projects in Spain have joined it, amongst whose there is to point out ELVI WINES, managed by Anne Aletà and Moises Cohen, a Sephardic family which has become the most important producer of kosher wines in Spain, with wineries in different parts of the country: Ribera de Jucar, Rioja, Priorat, Alella, Monsant, Penedes and Utiel-Requena, with a wide range of quality wines, which have received prestigious prizes and honourable mentions all around the world.

Other wine-growing regions and wineries, such as Ramón Bilbao, Gonzalez Byass, Faustino, Tagonius, Fernández Arcaya, Ruiz Viñaspre, Vallformosa, Paternina and Garzal have joined in and have contributed to the establishment of this type of wine as a reference on an international level, so that countries such as the United States or, to a lesser degree, Israel, are buying nearly all the kosher wine produced in Spain.

The Network of Spanish Jewish Quarters (Red de Juderías de España), within its endeavour to recover the Jewish culture and heritage of its cities, has launched different projects in order to promote gastronomy with Sephardic roots and kosher wine elaborated in Spain.

One of these projects is “Vineyards of Sepharad”, a tour of the vineyards and wineries producing kosher wine in Spain, as well as of those establishments committed to the recovery and promotion of the Jewish legacy of our cities, offering a range of activities related to kosher wine and Sephardic gastronomic culture.