While the majority of our grapes are harvested in the fall, the winemaker along with the vineyard manager and producer designate certain grapes to become Icewine. However Mother Nature and Jack Frost have the final word when the harvest takes place. 

Most Icewine grapes are mechanically harvested these days but there are still certain grapes varieties that require hand picking which was the norm not that long ago. So imagine this … 

As a member of the Icewine crew, it's Christmas Eve or (even worse) New Years’ Eve, when you get the call. That’s right, you leave your nice warm bed (or party), wear two pairs of socks, water proof gloves and bundle up as you'll soon find yourself  on your hands and knees picking grapes.

Icewine is harvested at night when temperatures dip and sustain at least - 8 Celcius long enough to get the grapes in. By our VQA  law, the grapes must reach a minimum 35 brix (sugar at harvest) to be recognized as authentic Icewine. Yes, that’s Icewine; one proprietary word. Icewine is to Canada what Champagne is to France.

So far this year the holiday celebrations have come early for the producers and pickers of this rare and luscious wine because we have already had the weather necessary for creating this delicious dessert wine. Last week with the wind chill coming off the lake it was minus -18 and harvest was underway.

Icewine is expensive business and you have to get as many frozen grapes off the vine as quickly as possible. Ideally vintners would prefer to pick Icewine grapes sometime between December and Valentine’s Day. Yes, we want the deep freeze but the longer on the vine the greater the loss. I recall one year we did not pick until March. After the extreme weather and rot that occurred, less than third of the crop was left on the vine.          

The preparation for Icewine begins in the autumn after our regular harvest when protective netting is draped over the vines to guard against the elements, the birds, and also to catch any grapes that fall. 

        

There are a number of stories on the origins of Eiswein, as it is called in Germany and Austria. One says a group on monks were surprised by an early freeze. Being resourceful they decided to make wine anyways and were delighted by their discovery.

While it can be said the Germans and Austrians discovered Icewine, we have the climate cold enough to produce every year, perfecting the making and marketing of Icewine. Here in Niagara we are the world's top producers and export to over 60 countries worldwide. 

Also made in British Columbia, Icewine has become an ambassador for Canadian wines and a national treasure. In 1991 Inniskillin’s Vidal Icewine won a Grand Prix d’Honneur at Vinexpo in Bordeaux and we have never looked back. 

The bulk of Canada’s Icewine is exported to Asia where it has become part of their gift-giving culture. Its popularity has also bred fraudulent Icewine (bulk wine to which sugar has been added). Counterfeit producers in the Asian market slap a maple leaf on the bottle and try to pass it of as authentic Icewine. The truth is in the the taste.

But everyone's palate is different and if you find it it too sweet, you can always make an Icewine Martini.

In extreme weather conditions many a winemaker and vineyard worker will admit how miserable the Icewine harvest and subsequent pressing is. All the while the phone rings with customers wanting to partake in the vineyard Icewine "experience".

I must say having worked for nearly a decade for one of the country’s premium producers, I never once felt the desire to partake. Personally I take my experience … in the glass.

                          

                            

In vino veritas,

© Scarlett Sumac 2010.

Photos used in this essay have been attributed. Others have been used by permission.