Vinzavod

Vinzavod, literal translation “wine factory,” was the term used in the former Soviet Union and now in Russia for the plant and facilities that manufacture a grape-flavored alcoholic beverage called vino (wine). Many of the Soviet Union’s largest vinzavods were located and continue to operate in the big cities far north of the grape growing areas of southern Russia. Three of the biggest are in Moscow. Another in Moscow has been converted to a trendy modern art district.

In Soviet Russia, except in parts of the south, vino production for the masses became a technical process divorced from the messy, fussy, expensive, capital-intensive and weather-dependent nurture and growth of wine grapes. Missing was the romance of “terroir,” the relationship between grape, climate, sun and soil so valued by Old World winemakers for centuries and New World winemakers for generations. Although winemaking thrived along the Black Sea coast in Greek villages 2,500 years ago, Russia’s first wineries opened there only towards the end of the 19th century. The development of the art of winemaking, the winemaker’s link between the vineyard and the process of vinification, was stunted after the Revolution.
In the Russian vinzavod of today, vino-material (fermented grape juice) is the principal ingredient. It comes from one or a combination of sources: bulk wine imported by container or grape concentrate shipped by the barrel from countries such as Tunisia, Spain or Chile, or from grapes produced in southern Russia in the regions between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. The vineyards of southern Russia do not produce nearly enough grapes to meet domestic consumer demand, and they are neither cost- nor quality-competitive with large western grape producers. Other ingredients of Russian vino could include sugar, alcohol, and essences and aromatics produced in Eastern and Central Europe such as “essence of Riesling.”
Read more in Passport Magazine