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Winemaking history in region reaches back to days of Sennacherib
Photo: Dan Lev
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Winery in Upper Galilee now producing 70,000 bottles annually
By SHLOMO PAPIRBLAT
MOSHAV SHACHAR - In 701 BCE, during the reign of Judean King Chizkiyahu, Assyrian ruler Sennacherib arrived with a massive army trained and hungry for battle in order to capture the region.
The Assyrians built their main camp in Lahish in the Upper Galilee, a strategic point on the route to Egypt.
Conquering the area was apparently important to Sennacherib. Upon returning to the Assyrian capital Nineveh, he ordered military historians to immortalize his conquest of Lahish.
Hundreds of years later, excavations in Nineveh uncovered this historical archive.
One of the findings was an engraving, which today resides in the British Museum in London, featuring a painting of beautiful vineyards found in Lahish’s eastern hills.
In those times, Lahish was known for excellent wines exported to distant lands for consumption.
Now, the Ramim Winery in Moshav Shachar, located next to an 8.6-acre (35 dunam) vineyard of Muscat grapes, is striving to rekindle this region’s golden age of winemaking.
Nehemia Yaakobi, a gynecologist by profession, runs the northern vineyard.
Nitzan Eliyahu, a doctor of physical and biological chemistry with a hand in both high tech and academia, brought a scientific approach to the art of winemaking, developed further after many experiments and meetings with experts.
This approach, combined with a significant investment in equipment, has allowed the winery to produce about 70,000 bottles annually - a good place in the middle of the road, quantitatively speaking.
Ramim, Yuval 2002 – Blend made of cabernet sauvignon grapes (52 percent) and the rest merlot, aged in Hungarian and American oak casks.
Swirled in the glass against the light, it displays a pleasant red with a
lavender background, rich fruity fragrances from which rise blossoming forest berries in power and a tickle of spices and wet tree bark
It has a pleasant touch to the palate, smooth, complex, alluring, harmonious. This wine optimistically suggests the heights to which this winery can attain. Price: 85 shekels.
Ramim, Merlot 2002 – Made purely from grapes from the Ramim Vineyard, this wine is aged 15 months in 400-liter wooden casks made of Hungarian oak.
It displays a pleasant purple in the glass, fragrance of strong plum greatly diluted with vanilla. Its touch to the palate is insufficiently harmonious. Price: 85 shekels.
Ramim, Merlot 2000 – A wine made with a small addition of cabernet sauvignon (5%), which is aged 18 months in American and French casks.
In the glass it reveals to the eye a seductive and alluring deep red-purple, with good and deep fragrances of forest bush fruit, spices and barrel vanilla. Price: 100 shekels.
Ramim Winery
Moshav Shachar
Northern Galilee
Tel: +972.54.4608080
Fax: +972.8.6849122
Email: enrad@multinet.net.il
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