Icewine

Did you know Canada.. Canada is one of the largest producers of Icewine in the world.

Icewine is a unique dessert wine produced from grapes that have been frozen while still on the vine. The sugars and other dissolved solids do not freeze, but the water does, allowing a more concentrated grape must to be pressed from the frozen grapes, resulting in a smaller amount of more concentrated, very sweet wine. It is said a frozen grape creates just one drop of Icewine. With ice wines, the freezing happens before the fermentation, not afterwards.

About 75% of the ice wine in Canada comes from Ontario. Niagara holds an Icewine Festival every year - the next one is January 13-29, 2012 and will be the 17th annual Niagara Icewine Festival. Inniskillin Wines is considered the most widely known Canadian icewine producer as the first Canadian winery to win a major international award, the Grand Prix d’Honneur at 1991 Vinexpo in France.

To create Icewine the grape must freeze below −8 °C (by law in Canada) while still on the vine. The grape must be pressed while it is still frozen so pickers often must work at night or very early in the morning to accomplish this task.

Icewine is a major export product for Canadian wineries. Much of the wine exported overseas is in the form of icewine.

Source: icewinefestival.com, Ontario Wine Society, Ontario Grapes