Canadian Icewine:  Liquid Gold!

The story of Canadian icewine begins just 30 years ago, a time when many new grape varieties were being planted in Ontario, new wineries were developing, and creativity and innovation in winemaking were in the air.  The first experimental icewines were made from a grape, Vidal, that had been developed by the French hybridizer J.L. Vidal in an attempt to create a phylloxera-resistant hybrid plant that would make decent table wine.  Since the Vidal grape has tough skin and ripens late while resisting rot and disease, our winemakers believed it would hang on the vine beyond the normal end of harvest into winter when the grapes would freeze and allow the production of a Canadian version of the German eiswein.  The initial wines were highly successful though made in rare quantities, and many wineries were encouraged to make icewine from Vidal and then Riesling, and before long from many other varietals.

By the 1990’s Canadian producers were making this liquid treasure with regularity and in lucrative commercial volumes and the star status of this nectar was assured world-wide.  Canadian icewine must be made by natural methods with the grapes remaining on the vines until they can be frozen naturally at -8 C. or lower, either very late in the year or even well into the next year.  They are picked, either by hand or machine, while still frozen and pressed while the temperature remains below -8C.  This freezes the water in the grapes while concentrating the sugar and fruit acids in the syrupy liquid that drips from the press, producing a yield perhaps 80% less than for table wine but with juice that will range from 35  degrees Brix to 42 Brix or even higher, virtually twice the sugar level of grapes harvested normally.  Fermentation at this brix level is challenging and usually a slow process, but the resulting wines are worth all of the extra cost, effort, and difficulty involved.

Canadian icewines are generally of modest alcohol, 9-11%, with considerable residual sweetness offset by solid acidity, a balance that guarantees their uniqueness, but it is the special character imparted from grapes harvested beyond their normal prime, dried, withered, with over-ripe flavours, that give icewine its marvelous taste.  Riesling is considered to be the premier variety for icewine, possessing a refined character that takes a few years to show best, but  a delicate and finer wine overall than icewine made from the hybrid Vidal which itself makes a more attractive icewine when young, full of peaches and apricots and honey.  Stoney Ridge Estate Winery continues to make both Vidal and Riesling icewines, award-winning wines of intense aroma and flavour, as well as Cabernet Franc icewine, a ‘red’ icewine that has become very popular as an alternative to the ‘golden’ icewines made from white grapes.  Cabernet Franc provides a lively cherry-red colour with strawberry aromas and taste.  In addition, Stoney Ridge winery was the first in Niagara to make Gewurztraminer icewine, a wine with seductive tropical fruit character, and we have experimented with Chenin Blanc and even barrel-fermented and barrel-aged icewines which tend to show a smoother and more lush finish.  The 1997 barrel-fermented and aged Stoney Ridge Gewurztraminer icewine won the trophy for the top dessert wine at Vinexpo in Bordeaux in 1999.

Naturally made Canadian icewines have won prestigious awards in every major wine competition world-wide over the last 20 years and are now considered to be the world’s most acclaimed dessert wine.  From Canada’s famously cold winters man and mother nature have combined to produce a stunning wine, to-day made according to very strict regulations to ensure consumer satisfaction with a product that is indeed, liquid gold, the envy of the wine-world.

Jim Warren, Founder of Stoney Ridge Estate Winery