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 Niagara icewines put Niagara on the world wine map. (Toronto Sun/Greig Reekie) |
If Great Wolf Lodge's water park is a mecca for kids, Inniskillin Wines, 15 minutes or so up the Niagara Parkway, may be the grown-up equivalent.
Our group was met by Debi Pratt, Inniskillin's public relations manager, as we pulled into the winery's headquarters just outside Niagara-on-the-Lake, who showed us vines of chilly vidal grapes that may eventually be part of 2007 vintage icewine.
Production of icewine, a European creation, began on a small scale in Canada in the early 1980s. It gained instant credibility when Inniskillin co-founder Karl Kaizer's 1984 Eisewein took the gold medal at the 1986 InterVin international competition, the only Canadian wine so honoured. Sales skyrocketed when his partner, Donald Ziraldo, took the 1989 vintage to the prestigious 1991 Vinexpo wine fair in Bordeaux, France, and won the Grand prix d'honneur. That got more Canadian vintners into icewine and players, such as Inniskillin, chasing overseas sales.
A visit to Inniskillin's Niagara operation is a great way to see how sweet, thick-skinned vidal grapes are grown, then turned into what the Vintners Quality Alliance -- Canada's almost two-decade-old fine wine standards watchdog -- accepts as icewine.
That means meeting rigorous requirements, Pratt said: growers and winemakers must be registered with VQA, grapes must be harvested after Nov. 15 each year and the product must meet strict technical standards for things such as sugar content.
The grapes must be between -8 C and -12 C at time of harvest; that means you need three straight days at about that temperature before you can harvest. Any warmer, the grapes don't freeze; much colder and pressing them yields nothing. They're still waiting to pick this year's crop; the earliest harvest was Dec. 2, the latest, March 5.
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Once the grape freezes, the 90 per cent of it that's water turns to ice crystals, leaving the remaining 10 per cent as juice to be extracted by pressing and fermented. That low yield is a big reason why icewines carry a premium price tag - Inniskillin sells half-bottles for $54.85 to $109.95, depending on variety and vintage.
But the payoff is icewine --"elegant" riesling, "luscious" vidal, "fruitier" cabernet franc and "delicate" sparkling, Pratt calls them. What she doesn't call them is "sweet," because that can turn off consumers. "We prefer the term, 'intense,' " she said.
In the Founders Hall, the key hospitality centre for public and private functions, you'll find the icewine tasting bar, demonstration kitchen and Riedel icewine glass experience -- yes, what glass you drink from makes a difference. Try it and see.
There's also the Frank Lloyd Wright-inspired Brae Burn Barn, home to Inniskillin's retail boutique and wine-tasting bars. It's open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily through April.
Public tours begin at 10:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. daily from November to April.