A new market coming to Baltimore County this year will focus on the growing world of kosher wines.
Eli Dinerman plans to open Baltimore Kosher Wine, offering hundreds, and eventually thousands, of bottles that are certified kosher, by this summer. The Pikesville resident is working to remodel a shop space at 310 Reisterstown Road and has a liquor license hearing for the venture scheduled on Monday.
Dinerman, a New York native who works as the chief compliance officer for Owings Mills-based Pulse Medical Transportation, was inspired by the kosher wine markets of Brooklyn, which is home to the largest Orthodox Jewish community in the United States. When he moved to the Baltimore area in 2016, he found many of the same resources he'd had there — Jewish schools, kosher restaurants and shops, a Jewish Community Center — but soon realized the wine offerings were slim.
The world of kosher wine extends way beyond the well-known Manischewitz, a sweet sacramental wine made of Concord grapes. Wines that have been certified Kosher come from all over the world and encompass a broad swath of varieties, from sweet dessert wines to robust cabernet merlots.
The market for kosher wine is growing quickly, at a rate of 20% a year, according to the Orthodox Union, a kosher certification agency.
In order to be deemed kosher, wines must be handled by Sabbath-observant Jewish people, but otherwise the growing and production process is the same.