Picture it – you’re sitting down relaxing with a nice meal of, let’s say, lean steak and salad. It’s served with an eye to portion control of course, because you are trying to lose weight right now. So does this mean you have to forego the glass of red wine you’d normally have with it?

Well let’s think about it for a moment. Do you actually know how many calories are in that glass of wine? If you’re only having a small glass it might raise your eyebrows to realize it has only a little more than eighty calories if it’s a dry wine, and a hundred if it’s a sweet one.

That’s all very well, but can I really lose weight by drinking wine?

Let’s be honest here. Some diets will have you believe that wine is the enemy. You shouldn’t be drinking it and that’s that. But the best diet of all – one that actually works – is to eat what you enjoy in moderation. We all know that the best way to lose weight is to consume less than you expend in energy each day. This means that if you want to have a glass of wine you can, provided you don’t go over your calorie totals for the day.

This is great news when you think about it, because you’ve got more freedom to enjoy that glass of red wine you love so much! In fact you could stand a better chance of losing weight this way than you would if you were to deprive yourself of the wine altogether.

Is total deprivation a bad thing?

Yes it certainly can be, and a nice glass of wine is really no different in this respect. Let’s think about this for a moment. Suppose you are used to having and enjoying a drop of red wine maybe three nights a week with your dinner. Just the one glass, but you really enjoy it.

Now if your diet says you cannot drink any more, how much do you think you would miss it? For some people red wine is just as enjoyable as chocolate is to others. If you loved chocolate you would probably struggle to eliminate it completely from your diet. The same applies to red wine. If you allow yourself a little treat like this every day or two, you would be surprised at how much easier it can be to keep on track with your diet in the long run.

Of course red wine also has good health benefits. Just take a look at the diets of people in France to get an idea of how you can benefit in this sense. They eat well and live well, but they also have a regular consumption of wine that seems to help them health wise. So if a glass of red wine really does make you feel positive about the fact you’re dieting, then carry on drinking the occasional glass rather than depriving yourself.

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A wine begins its koshering once plucked from the vine, as it is sown and cultivated in the same way as other wines. It may be picked by anyone, not necessarily a kosher or Jewish person. The grapes to be used for the wines are then taken to the winery, where they are crushed. This process needs to be performed under a rabbi’s supervision. The rabbi physically tips the grapes into the crusher and sometimes operates the necessary equipment. This is an integral requirement for a kosher wine’s production.

The barrels in which the kosher wines are to be fermented need to be judged worthy for such a use. After the grapes have been crushed under rabbinal supervision, the rest of the process and even the handling of the grapes and juice need to be performed by a Jewish person that observes the Sabbath faithfully. Even thought the rabbi does not necessarily need to be involved in the wine-making process, he does need to oversee the entire progression to the final product. Kosher wines even need to be opened by a kosher waitron. None of the work involved in producing a kosher wine may be done on the Sabbath.
 
Meshuval wines are kosher wines that have been flash-pasteurized by boiling (or nearly boiling) and cooling them very rapidly. Advanced technology means that there is very little, if any, difference to the taste of these wines kosher wines compared to non-meshuval wines. Pasteurising the wine in this way renders it kosher immediately, regardless of how it is handled thereafter. In South Africa, though, meshuval wines are rare and are more common in North America and Israel. The rabbi would operate the pasteurization equipment.
 
The wines carry an official seal of approval called the hechsher. The reason that a wine has to be deemed kosher (since it contains none of the forbidden foods of Judaism) is owing to its important role in non-Jewish religions. Using it for these purposes is considered to be idolatry. Therefore, wines need to be kosher to ensure that they are free from any form of idolatry before being consumed by a Jewish person. Of course, kosher wines can not contain anything that is derived from a non-kosher source, such as gelatine or isinglass.
 
South Africa, along with a few other countries around the world, has recently seen an increased demand for kosher wines. This may be related to the fact that methods for ensuring correctly koshered wines are becoming more widespread.
 
In South Africa, good quality kosher wines are available from Norman Goodfellows, Kleine Draken and Nwanedi. Some recommended vintages include:
 
· Eshkol Shiraz 2003 – the Eshkol Winery in Paarl produces excellent kosher wines.
· Welnerberg Cabernet Sauvignon 2005 – From South Africa’s Swartland, this full-bodied red is ideal for red meat dishes.
· Welnerberg Pinotage 2005 – this wine enjoys fruitier flavors and a slightly lighter body.

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