How to Collect Icebox Wines

Icebox wines, commonly referred to as ice wine, are made with grapes that freeze on the vine. These frozen grapes result in a sweet, concentrated dessert wine. Except for wine connoisseurs, most people aren't familiar with icebox wines, so consider the following tips when you want to choose or collect ice wines.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

1. Find genuine frozen-on-the-vine icebox wines. Authentic icebox wines are procured from naturally frozen grapes. Since frozen grapes can only be picked off the vine in the middle of the night to preserve their quality, some ice wine producers substitute artificially frozen grapes. To ensure you collect genuine ice wines, look for the initials VQA (Vintners Quality Alliance) on the bottle.

2. Check out ice and icebox wines from Germany. This country originated the icebox wine making process. Some brands of German icebox wine contain flower, apricot or peach flavors. Riesling and Huxelrebe are the most popular varieties of Eiswein, as its called in Germany.

3. Collect ice wines from Ontario and other Canadian regions. Riesling ice wine, produced from grapevines situated along Lake Ontario, makes a fresh tasting wine with hints of raisin and honey. For the more exotic palate, Canadian ice wine made with Vidal grapes has hints of mango and apricot.

4. Sample fine Austrian ice wines. Austria allows only naturally frozen grapes in their ice wines. It's a law, so you know you're drinking the real thing when you enjoy wines made from the Scheurebe or Traminer grape. Heiss Winery even presses a red grape called Blaufränkisch to produce an exotic berry-flavored ice wine.

5. Enjoy American icebox wines. These ice wines hail from Washington state, Idaho or the Niagara falls region of New York. Many American wineries employ the artificial method with their grapes, so the wines lack the crisp authenticity of Canadian or European ice or icebox wines. Always check the label to ensure you're buying true ice wine.

Tips & Warnings

• The term ice wine usually refers to authentic frozen-on-the-vine wines, and icebox wine identifies the artificial variants. Some people may use the term "ice wines" to refer to both types of wine.
• Icebox wines cost much more to produce than regular wine, and usually originate from cold weather regions like Canada, the Pacific Northwest and Austria.
• Many Canadian ice box wines have a large percentage of sugar, so keep that in mind when you collect ice wine. A U.S. citizen can bring 1 liter of wine **** back home after a trip to Canada.

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