With the holiday season fast approaching, show your high net-worth clients that you appreciate their business by giving them one of the treasures of the frigid Canadian winter: a bottle of the luscious elixir known as icewine.

As a gift, icewine can be a valuable addition to a wine cellar or a special treat to open during the upcoming season.

“Icewine is elegant,” says Toronto-based sommelier Janice Merson. “It’s like caviar, a rare and expensive treat.”

That means it carries a richer price-tag than a typical bottle of red or white table wine. Prices start at about $30 for a 375-millilitre bottle of Vidal and run to considerably loftier heights for premium products such as wines sold in hand-blown glass bottles.

Royal DeMaria Wines, a Beamsville, Ont., winery that produces icewine exclusively and has had its vintages requested by Queen Elizabeth, has several international award-winning wines, including a $5,000 Meritage icewine made from a blend of Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon grapes. Some wineries, including Ontario-based Inniskillin Wines and Magnotta Winery, offer a gift set of three 50-ml bottles for less than $30.

So what makes icewine so unique — and expensive? The exquisite dessert wine caresses the tongue with hints of raisin, apricot, peach, mango and pear, mixed with rich undertones of caramel, honey and toffee. A rich amber colour imbued with shades of burnished gold creates the effect of liquid sunshine, although it requires bitterly cold weather to coax the exotic flavors from the grapes.

Icewine is made from grapes that are frozen naturally on the vine and not harvested until the winter. The temperature must be below minus 8?C for a continuous period of two or three days before the grapes can be harvested, and they are pressed immediately while still frozen, separating the nectar from the skin and the frozen ice crystals inside. Over the winter, there are usually several freeze/thaw cycles in which temperatures drop but are not sustained long enough to freeze the grapes entirely; these temperature fluctuations add complexity to the wines that cannot be replicated by artificial freezing.

The small amount of juice obtained from the frozen grapes is highly concentrated in acids, sugars and aromatics, and is fermented slowly for several months. Yields are usually about one-tenth of those of regular grapes; sometimes it takes the fruit of an entire vine just to make one bottle. The low yield is the reason for icewine’s rarity and its high prices.

Icewine was discovered in the late 1700s in Franconia, Germany, when winter arrived early and froze the unpicked grapes. Rather than lose the entire crop, the winemakers decided to harvest and press the frozen grapes, and accidentally discovered eiswein.

Icewine was first made in Canada by Walter Hainle, a German immigrant who settled in British Columbia’s Okanagan Valley and produced a small quantity of icewine in 1973 that reminded him of the delicacy he’d tasted as a youth. It took some convincing for Okanagan grape growers to leave sufficient grapes on the vines until the frosty weather arrived, but Hainle Vineyards ultimately made its first commercial batch in 1978.

Most of the world’s icewine now comes from Ontario’s Niagara region, where grapes ripen in the hot summer sun, then dehydrate in autumn after being left on the vine. Harvest time can be a frantic rush to pick grapes in the dead of frigid nights when the temperature is right.

“In the winter, we are often up checking two or three times a night to see if the conditions are ideal for harvesting,” says Thomas Green, chief winemaker at Niagara’s Lakeview Winery. “If the temperature falls below minus 10?C, the grapes are like marbles and can’t be pressed. When the time is right, we have everyone out there working shifts around the clock, picking grapes by hand.”

Although icewine made from hearty Vidal grapes is the most popular, there are several other varieties, including Reisling, Gewürztraminer, Pinot Gris, Cabernet Franc, Chardonnay, Merlot and Muscat Ottonet. There is also sparkling icewine.
“The effervescence takes away some of the sweetness, but it also takes away some of the characteristic intensity of icewine,” Merson says of sparkling icewine.
Icewine can be enjoyed in its youth or aged for up to 25 years. With age, colours darken, and flavours and aromas deepen. The natural acidity lingers longer, providing a harmonious balance to the sweetness.

@page_break@“Icewine is known as a dessert wine, but it can be enjoyed in many different ways,” says Deborah Pratt, public relations manager at Inniskillin, one of the largest producers of icewine in Canada. “It’s wonderful with blue cheese and is also good with dried fruit or fruitcake, or with grilled, unsalted nuts. The ultimate combination is icewine and foie gras.”

Icewine can be ordered online or by telephone from individual wineries or from Icewine Niagara (www.icewineniagara.net), an exporter that offers a broad selection. Wineries often provide gift-wrapping or personalized cards. IE