Ice, Ice Wine
''Ice, Ice Baby'' it's the right saying, because I don't want to upset rapper Vanilla Ice and all the 90's music fans out there. But what if i tell you that Ice Wine actually exists. You won't believe what it's made from. It's there in the name! Have you got it yet? YES, grapes! That's the correct answer. You got that right.
What actually ice wine is
Ice wine is a sweet wine made from grapes (Riesling or Vidal) that are left on the vine to freeze. Making ice wine is all at the mother nature's sudden desire to offer this gift, allowing the best fruit to remain on the plant. Consider this like natural selection, or survival of the fittest. What causes ice wine to be sweet in the first place is the frost itself as the water in the grape freezes, leaving all that natural sugar behind for the winery to squeeze.
How ice wine is made
That process of making is simple if people hurry to press the grapes while they are frozen. That's why the picking of the grapes is done somewhere at night when most of us are sleeping and dreaming about that glass of ice wine wine to enjoy with the loved one sharing a crème brûlée(my personal best match). The temperatures could be as low as -12oC and picking is done by hand.
As the grapes are already frozen, when they are pressed, only the sweetest juice which has a lower freezing temperature comes out of the press.
Photo by winesofcanada
Where ice wine is made
Well it depends as you may have noticed it needs cold weather for this wine to hit our glasses. Some people may think about The Poles, but actually it's not the case here. South Pole is for the penguins and North Pole, the polar bears, so no room for grape picking. Russia? Most likely Vodka there and that's out of discussion.
You can listen to Flat Earth Society, since they believe the globe, sorry, the disc (as they call it) with 50 meters wall of ice, around the rim, is guarded by NASA employees to prevent people from climbing over and falling off the disc. So maybe ice wine comes from there? No way. NASA won't let anyone go in the middle of the night to pick grapes.
The two major countries producing ice wine at the moment are Germany and Canada. In Germany, it is called Eiswein and is more expensive than that in Canada. Another country that is slowly gaining its reputation and my favourite, is China. Believe it or not, Chinese ice wines from different wineries were awarded three out of the five gold medals at the Decanter World Wine Awards 2017.
Where you can find ice wine
In almost all restaurants and some supermarkets, but keep in mind it will never come cheap and they are always in small bottles. Yet, it's a wine that is worthy of all the struggle and paying in a supermarket at least £30 for a 375ml bottle. It will be worth every single penny that you've spent. Frozen and fabulous, the most tropical wine that you have ever had. And that's a promise. That will take you straight to holiday after the first sip. And if you have the chance to have it, just think of those people working at -12oC for you to enjoy this in the comfort of your home, or your favourite restaurant.
''At the end of the day, you really can’t make a wrong choice.
As long as you pay attention to what it is that you don’t like about a wine
each bottle will get you closer to what you do like.
Take it one glass at a time!''