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Tuesday, 25 September 2007 |
Hubbard Center brings wine of the Middle East to Appalachian
 A participant in the Wine of the Middle East Workshop enjoys a glass of Turkish Wine. Shanel Boston
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by ALLISON CASEY
Lifestyles Reporter
No wines from France, Italy or California were found as the Hubbard Center hosted a wine workshop and lecture Friday.
Instead, the “Wines of the Middle East” workshop featured wines like Ksar and Yarden from Morocco and Israel.
Faculty members tasted wines from Israel, Lebanon, Turkey, Cyprus and Morocco.
“We try to expose faculty to wines that are not so familiar. Everyone’s
consumed enough California wine to know what that tastes like,”
chemistry professor and wine lecturer Dr. Grant N. Holder said. “It’s
not every day you get to taste a wine from Morocco.”
Wine tasters go through a three-step process for determining the wine quality.
 An assortment of wine, figs, and olives were offered during the Wines of the Middle East workshop. Shanel Boston
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First, wine is visually checked for clarity, bubbles, and an overall clean appearance and ranked from zero to three.
Then, the wine is smelled and ranked on a scale of zero to six.
Finally, the wine is tasted and ranked on a scale of zero to eight.
“There’s a very strong correlation between what you like and who you are,” Holder said.
“You’re not supposed to like the reds or supposed to like the whites.”
The early wine industry started in Armenia and played an important role in Middle Eastern society.
Since many water sources could not be trusted, wine was used to purify the water.
Most people drank about a gallon of wine a day, he said.
“What does that tell you? That the wine of today is not the same wine they drank then,” Holder said.
In 1955, two-thirds of the wine traded internationally came from Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia.
“The Middle East is perfect for growing grapes,” he said. “There’s 300
days of sunshine and the rains come just at the right time.”
There are five wine regions in Israel alone: Galilee, Shomran, Samson, Judean Hills and Negeu.
“Some of the most high quality wines come out of Israel,” Holder said.
The wine workshops are held in part to foster the growth of the North Carolina wine industry, Holder said.
Wines frequently come out of the Western parts of continents because the climate is ideal for grape growing, Holder said.
“Red [wine] is difficult to do in North Carolina, partly because of the soil and the age of the industry,” he said.
The Hubbard Center hosts frequent workshops for faculty members ranging
from group work and orientation to how to use classroom clickers,
Hubbard Center graduate assistant Christina B. Tadlock said.
Planning for the wine workshop started last semester with Appalachian’s growing wine program.
After a similar wine tasting program had great success last year, the
center decided to do the same program with a different wine region, she
said.
The workshops are closed to students.
Holder will present another workshop Nov. 8 titled “Wine and Chocolate”
to be held in the Hubbard Center room 1028 of the Old Belk Library
Classroom Building.
Registration is $35.
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