Ice Wine

In Karen MacNeil's Wine, Food, and Friends I read about ice wine or Eiswein. It's a dessert wine made from grapes that are frozen on the vine and then pressed. The water stays behind as ice and only juice is extracted.

This description fascinated me and I imagined ... I don't know, icy wine crystals I guess and I wanted to see how this translated into wine.

So, on our field trip to Total Wine , we found the ice wines. They are from Germany or Canada. They ranged in price from $15 - $75. I was prepared to go up to around $30, but in this case I went with the cheaper edition for the shallow reason that I liked it's packaging and label better than the higher priced wine. Oh, and it's a half bottle size and it's poured in 2 ounce servings.

Jackson-Triggs Vidal Icewine was the lowest priced and since we had no idea what to expect (and it had nice 'rich' looking packaging) we decided to start at the bottom of the price tier and will work our way up.

We opened the Vidal and had our 2 oz. pour a couple of nights ago, then again last night.

It's a rich amber color, it pours thick, almost like cough syrup. I sniffed and got a deep floral scent. Wine Snob Hubby wasn't sure what he smelled until I said flowers. He sniffed again and said, "Yes, roses."

It is a very gentle flavor, not harsh at all. We had it alone, without food, and I'd like to try it with something to see how it holds up. I tasted apples and a hint of the florals. It's a very concentrated taste.

We'll try it again with a food, then move our way up the price scale to compare.