Ice Wine: A Wine for All Seasons
It has been a perfect dinner. The restaurant’s ambiance is exceeded only by its superb cuisine, while each dish was paired with a wine that you carefully chose to compliment every subtle ingredient. All that is left is dessert, and a beverage to accompany it. Is there some drink to end dinner that is in vogue and can show off your knowledge and suavity? Chocolate martinis are so 90’s, and flavored vodkas are now all too common to be impressive. Fine Port can be outrageously expensive, inexpensive late harvest dessert wines are frequently too cloying, and too many restaurants fail to offer reasonably priced late harvest gems. What to do, what to do? Fortunately, one solution to the problem would be to ask for the list of Ice Wines.
As the very name suggests, this libation, no matter what people call it (sometimes Eiswein, Ledova Vino, Vin de Glacier, or a myriad of combinations of Ice, Wine, Eis, or Wein), is made from grapes which have frozen on the vine. As opposed to long hanging late harvest wines (such as Sauterne or Trockenbeerenauslese) that have been affected by the noble rot botrytis, grapes for ice wines are healthy at the time of harvest, which many people believe gives the fruit finer clarity, greater acid, and a more pronounced, vibrant taste. One thing is certain–there is usually
a distinct difference in late harvest and ice wines. To us, it is primarily in the body. Ice wines are frequently fuller through the middle of the mouth, while maintaining their crisp identity.
A relative newcomer to the wine scene, legend has it that in 1794 a German winemaker in Franconia found some of his grapes frozen by an early frost, and decided to press these grapes separate and apart from those not frozen. In the 21st century, almost all northern hemisphere wine producing countries make ice wines from fruit that is kept on the vine until the temperature falls to under 20 degrees F (usually late into December). When produced correctly and with care, these beautiful concoctions are now serious wines worthy of drinking at special occasions. This has not always been so, as until the early 90s the quality of most ice wines had not yet risen to the fine levels seen today.
For many reasons, good ice wines can be expensive, though many are quite affordable for all. Grapes are mostly comprised of water, which is of course what freezes in this process. When a
frozen grape is pressed, only the sweet juice is released from the grape while the water remains trapped in the skin in the form of ice crystals. As most of the grape itself is left behind, this means a great many grapes must be used for a relatively
small amount of liquid (often an entire vine only makes a single 375 ml. bottle). In fact, this one vine to 375 ml. ratio is why most ice wines are sold in half bottles.
Most producers argue that grapes must be picked at the first frost, since a freeze/thaw/freeze cycle can impart strange flavors. Thus, harvesters may
sometimes remain on call for many nights as the producer waits for the temperature to fall into the requisite numbers. Correspondingly, producers temperatures before the right time arrives. When it does, the fruit must be completely gathered in the cold darkness so grapes remain frozen. And even as everyone waits for the night of reckoning, days refuse to allow time for rest. Employees must be at the ready to defend these still aging grapes from animals and birds. Put all these factors together, and one understands why ice
wines are sometimes costly.
Once the juice is finally pressed from the grapes,
the wine-to-be typically undergoes weeks of fermentation, followed by a few months of barrel aging. What results is a thick liquid of beautiful golden to deep amber colors. Ice wine is properly consumed chilled in small dessert wine glasses,
and descriptors regularly recognize tastes of melon, apricot, mangos, peaches, and/or other sweet fruits.
In the United States (and perhaps a few other countries), some producers have found a way to make what they still refer to as an ice wine, even without all the harvesting hassles described above. In this process they place the grapes into a
freezer. As the ultimate process is essentially the same and the water freezes in a cold field or in a man-made ice box, we aren’t so sure most people can actually identify a traditionally made ice wine from non with any regularity.
In North America and the rest of the ice wine making world, Riesling is a grape of choice for ice wines. Vidal is a staple in Canada and the northern U.S., while Cabernet Franc and Gewurtztraminer are being seen from time to time. Besides Riesling, European winemakers employ Blaufrankisch, Gruner Veltliner, Scheurebe, and Traminer.
It is always fun to introduce others to something new. With ice wines, the novelty is accompanied by quality—an impressive and exciting combination.