KFWE February 4 2013 NYC

[Elchonon Hellinger]

why is cali much cheaper than ny ? im pushing my friends to come.. but 105$ is still a lot for non wine nuts

[David Raccah]

Elk - we are talking about a 5 dollar difference - no?

david

[E Segel]

Where is everyone? OK I'll be there first one to say it - first time attending this event and had a blast! Tasted alot of wines I had drank previously but a few new ones and standouts - Alexander Cabernet Franc (09 I believe, great!), the excellent Capcanes La Flor del Flor and also the fantastic upcoming Rose (and also Carignan which was an "insider" wine, unlabeled and pulled out from hiding for me to taste but unfortunately for me I did not appreciate...but I did have a great chat with Jurgen Wagner!), Psagot Prat (I'm only recently starting to appreciate the beauty of a good port, plus it was good to catch up with Yakov Berg whom I had recently met when I visited the Psagot winery a few weeks a go), all the Covenant wines but definitely enjoyed the new vintage of the Red C Sauvignon Blanc which is being released shortly and always one of my favorite QPR whites, plus it was great to finally meet Jeff, Jodie and Jonathan in person after all these years, Herzog both new (single vineyard Oakville CS - not impressed) and old (08 Clone 6 CS - FANTASTIC yet again!!!), ELVI EL26 and a whole bunch of french wines new and old to me....the list goes on but as I do not consider myself anything close to a "serious" or "professional" wine drinker but more just really one who enjoys good wine (no offense to anyone here!) I did not note details for many of the wines I drank but just enjoyed myself and the company I was with, plus all of the people I met and got to catch up with. Definitely a fun and entertaining experience and looking forward to attending next year's event.

[Josh Kramer]

Amazing event as always, and for me, no time for tasting notes for me, too much food, wine and good company to enjoy! Made mental notes on the wines I enjoyed most. Agreed with above - the Covenant SB was really good, I'd never had the previous vintage either. Amongst others, Alexander and even more so, Tulip, Cab Francs both outstanding. Alexander Amaralo and Grand Reserve, Psagot Single Vineyard, , Flam (all the Reserves), Herzog Clone 6, and some I've enjoyed previously - Barkan Superiour and Carmel Mediteranean, 2 consistently great wines. I liked the Tzuba and Covenant Chardonnays too. My palette gave out before I could really get a good grip on the French wines, and some of the others.
Food Wise - Best dishes I had were - Prime Grill burger & short ribs, Le Marais Hanger steak, Pardes, Joburg Biltong bruschetta thingy, Wolf & Lamb braised veal on turnip mash, Gemstone BBQ meat and Abigaels chilli w Guac. Good times!

[David Raccah]

OK, first of all the wine event was great, the wines that I tasted were ok but not great or wow, but that is my opinion. There were many great wines and a large number of wines that I did not enjoy, and the rest were fine. Some shockers on the downside and a few shockers on the upside. The overall event was a bit crowded in the evening but, thanks to Royal, I had more than enough time to taste the wines I wanted to taste and enjoy some food along the way - YES! Going to both events allows for food consumption! Again, to me I skipped MANY GREAT wines because I had them already, and I tasted wines I did not have that were not so great and many that were lovely! Overall, if you tasted through every wine at the event (god help you) - I would say many wines would be GREAT, and some that were not so enjoyable.

The best food tables: MASSIVE hunks of meat the Pomegranate, et-al's lamb bacon wrap was awesome, etc's mole was nice, frinchie's sweets were nice and REALLY sweet, gemstone's veal belly was nice along with the polenta, skipped anything that said cholent - LOL!!!, skipped glatt-a-la-carte, I think I tatsed gotham burger, it was OK, The facon sanwich at Jack's was OK - nothing great, Le Marias was ok,

BEST dish by far was the lamb wrap by et-al and pardess's madness on a plate - officially called stuffed beef carpacio

missed abigales, basil, carlos should have been missed, missed coffee & bean, missed (I think) hakodeh bbq, missed the short rib sliders at heavenly, skipped joburg, skipped pitapia, and noidue (too long a line for coffee).

Ok, that was the overall sense of the place. Poor Gary was trying his hardest to not lose his mind. Ny is NY guys, and you can tell them to do something, but that just makes them want to ignore you, add in booze and all bets are OFF! I REALLY hope Gary L. enjoyed himself. He put in GOBS AND GOBS of time and sweat and effort into the ting. Thousands came and enjoyed it, wine was pouring like it was water and overall it was successful again. The venue is large enough, the issue is the crowd and controlling it. To me, I loved it. However, listening to patrons, who paid good money - it was a bit testy at times - but hey they are New Yorkers. Royal clealy did their best and tried to lay out the wines and food to make for the best of the event - to me, it is always an issue of space to people, and unless they get Grand Central Station - it will always be a bit crowded.

Now on to the wines - AGAIN THESE are my opinions! My 2 cents:

1) 1848 wines were not interesting - they are well made wines but far too sweet and far too much raisin and date riddled. The 2010 Cabernet Franc was nice
2) Alexander Winery - was way too sweet! Shocked here, as I loved the Amorolo last year and this was nothing short of cheese or port or liquor notes - way too sweet. The Cabernet Franc was OK, the rest was not for me.
3) Passed on Alfasi and Balma Venise
4) Barkan table was shocklingly so - so. Loved the 2008/2009 Assemblage, the 2010 was not near that. The altitude wines were ok, the Superiour was ok, really just OK, not poor
5) Skipped Herzog and Baron herzog
6) The French table was so-so, some were so-so (Parsac 2011, Medoc 2010, 2010 Perigord), some were not interesting, some were GREAT (Pontet Canet, Poyferre 2005, Malartic 2005, Montviel 2004). The 2007 Dupre was ok, the 2005 lecrock was not, 2006 Piada was ok, shocked by the 2002 valnadraud being not so good at all, the 2004 Tour was not good, Lacare 2010 was bad, Rollan 2010 was bad, Seran was so-so.
7) Binyamina 2007 Chosen Diamond was going bad fast, skipped the reserve wines, 2009 Ruby was nice. The 2009 cave was 90 score or so, the 2009 Cave mevushal was cooked - really. The 2009 Diamond was not blowing me away.
skipped bokobsa
9) Capcanes was awesome - the 2010 wines were nice. The le for 2011 was nice, the 2012 rose was OK (not loved it) while the 2012 carignan was really nice
10) skipped carmel - and I may have missed the Limited as I doubt that will make an appearance in LA
11) Clos Mesorah was nice as always
12) Covennat was really nice - all of them were great. I got to taste teh 2003, 2004, 2006, 2007 Covenant wines (YAY!) All were great! The 2010 and 2012 wines were at the table and the sauvignon blanc was bright and lovely!
13) The Castel table was skipped - nothing new there, but the 2010 Castel C that I tasted last year was really nice as is the 2009 GV, the 2010 PC is so-so
14) Netofa table was skipped, as I was at the winery a few weeks ago - LOVELY wines - taste them.
15) Drappier wines - skipped - lovely wines as well!
16) Skipped much of Elvi - as time got away from me. I tasted the whites and the older whites were not so great. The Adar 2007 is great, the herenzas are great.
17) Flam wines great
18) I know I will regret this - I really did not enjoy the Gamla wines - again way too sweet - but well built wines
19) skipped goose bay
20) Hagafen wines continue make me happy, the 2009 Cab was blue and lovely, the Franc is nice, the Pinot Noir is nice, the white wines were great, including the late disgorged brut cuvee
21) LOVED the 2010 Shiraz from Harkham - like when I tasted it at the special tasting in LA from Harkham.
22) The Madmon Soreka was really too sweet, overripe, and not so well built - again my opinion
22) The pacifica wines shocked to the down side - not sure why, but they tasted far too sweet again - dried fruit, candied fruit - again - my 2 cents
23) Psagot was AWESOME!!!!
24) Segal Dishon wines were OK, though a bit too sweet
25) skipped shiloh
26) Tulip was nice, but the 2010 reserve cabernet was a bit too sweet, but the rest are very impressive
27) skipped tzuba
28) skipped weinstock, yatir, and zion

[Joshua London]

Yep, good fun as always. Kudos to Gary L.!
This year I only stayed for the earlier "trade" portion, but tasted everything. Always nice to see and chat with Yossie Horwitz! Reminds me that I just don't make it to NY very often these days. Likewise, it was a pleasure to meet, however briefly, David Raccah, Yehoshua Werth, and Bill Coleman and his wife. Sorry I missed the chance to meet others from this forum who were there. Don't have my notes in front of me, but there were some lovely and interesting wines. Off the top of my head, the new Hagafen White Riesling (dry) and their 2009 Cabernet Franc were both outstanding, also the new Capçanes Rosé was a treat, likewise greatly enjoyed tasting through some of the library Covenant wines. I also enjoyed the new releases from Netofa, Flam, Barkan "Assemblage", the excellent Goose bay Fume Blanc, the new Tzuba, and I know there were others...but my memory is failing me at the moment.

[Bill Coleman]

Got to meet Josh and Yossie. We should have arranged some way to identify each other!

[Yossie Horwitz]

As always, the event was a lot of fun and it was great catching up with some many forumites and old friends. Also, quite a treat to spend some time with Howard Goldberg! Kudos to Garl L. for what must be a monumental amount of work (not to mention pain in the arise dealing with all the varied constituents). While I was there primarily for the food, given the fact that I was attending IFWF for the first time (see my write up on the other thread), I was able to spread my tasting between the two events which allowed for more socializing with the winery representatives and fellow oenophiles and also allowed me to partake is some of the culinary delights offered. While next week's newsletter will be a full write up of the two events, I wanted to briefly summarize a few things here.

There were actually quite a few winemakers present, with a number of winery representatives as well. There was a great selection of wines, although somehow it felt that there were less "new" wines than in prior years. However, this may have to do with the increase in tastings I have attended over the last six months or so, which availed me of many new wines. On the negative side and as with last year's event, many of the better wines weren't showing very well and understandably so. High end, newly released wines are, in many events, not yet ready to drink and require sufficient aeration before becoming approachable - something nearly impossible to attain in a mass tasting setting. Additionally, the crowds (a perpetual problem and the result of Royal's own success at making this a great event) and the proximity to the food, made conducting true tastings more difficult. Add the sheer number of wines, inebriation of a substantial percentage of the crowd (by 8:00 forget about getting "anything done") and you have an event that should be considered more social than professional. Even the "trade" portion conducted earlier in the day has become overrun with non-trade folks, who are granted access for one reason or another and clog up the tastings. It turned out that the "best" part of the event was the second showing for Press, during the hour before the event was opened to the public. Folks were rested, it was relatively serene and you could actually get real tasting done and chat with the winery reps as well.

While the food component of the event has been growing for the last few years, this was the first year in which I felt that it had become the majority of the event! Not only space-wise, where it now takes up more than half the space (an estimate of my untrained eye), it also easily attracts more people, making it more difficult to enjoy the truly gourmet offerings some of the vendors were offering.

All in all, a truly enjoyable event and one that affords you the ability to enjoy amazing and expensive wines with gourmet food. Best advice to fully enjoy the evening - have a few wines you really want to try (not more than 10) plus 2-3 dessert wines and pace yourself. Have a glass or two, a couple bites to eat, take a breathe of fresh air and socialize a bit. As long as you don't feel like you need to try everything or "get your money's worth", this is a terrific event.

Purely subjectively, the following were among the wines I truly enjoyed at the event and would recommend you do as well (some of these were tasted at IFWF but were present at KFWE):

Binyamina, Odem, Syrah, 2009
Capcanes, La Flor, Carignan, 2012 (barrel sample)
Capcanes, Petita, Rose, 2012
Capcanes, Peraj HaAbib, 2010 (Magnum). At IFWF they were pouring a 2008 Magnum.
Domaine Netofa, Tinto, 2011 (IFWF). Much better than the 2010 version.
Hagafen, Dry Riesling, 2011. Nice to have another versatile and well made Riesling on the kosher market.
Shiloh, Secret Reserve, Shiraz, 2010 (IFWF)
Elvi, Reserve, Rioja, 2009. Amazing wine and the best Rioja I have tasted. Unfortunately this will be priced around $70 which is a little excessive for Rioja...
Elvi, Rosado, 2011. Another new Rose and a welcome newcomer to the club of crisp, mineral and refreshing Rose wines. Not sure why they weren't showing the 2012...
Yatir, Cabernet Sauvignon, 2009. Also nice to do a comparison between the 2007 and 2009 red blend wines...
Carmel, Appellation, Petite Sirah, 2009
The two 2009 Kayoumi wines were terrific. I thought the 2010 Riesling was better than the 2011.
Herzog, Single Vineyard, Mt. Veeder, Cabernet Sauvignon, 2009. Liked it much better than last year - has improved immensely with time.
I love the 2005 Leoville and Le Crock but they weren't showing well at the event.
Covenant 2003 (tasted at the Covenant event but was poured at KFWE) was a treat. An amazing wine, even more so for a first effort.
Segal, Single Vineyard - Dishon, Cabernet Sauvignon, 2009
Flam - everything was really great, although I prefer the 2012 Rose and Blanc to the 2011 vintages. The Reserve Syrah is especially good.
Psagot, Single Vineyard, Cabernet Sauvignon, 2010
Tulip, Mostly, Cabernet Franc, 2010
Tulip, Reserve, Syrah, 2010. I know some folks didn't like it. I did.
1848, Reserve, Cabernet Sauvignon, 2009. I also thought the Generation 2 wines provided good value.
1848, Generation 5, Cabernet Franc, 2010. Also the 2010 Generation 5 White Blend.
Harkham, Shiraz, 2010 was a very pleasant surprise.


I tasted a lot of unimpressive wines, together with many wines that were showing much more poorly than they had in Israel and even at the JW blind tasting I judged a few weeks ago, in which many of the wines at the event were judged.

[David Raccah]

My take on the wines I tasted at KFWE and the event overall:

http://kosherwinemusings.com/2013/02/20 ... s-billing/

David

[Andrew Breskin]

Excellent report, wish I was there!