Canadians may not have invented icewine, but they certainly have perfected it. The cold winters provide ideal conditions for the production of icewines that are winning legions of new customers around the world—and earning top awards for quality and excellence at international wine competitions.
For ten days in January each year, the Niagara region hosts the world’s largest tasting of Canada’s internationally acclaimed icewines and other premium wines. The Niagara Icewine Festival reveals the incredible local bounty of wine and culinary experiences the region has to offer. From gala evenings, ornate ice bars, celebrity chefs and winemaker’s dinners to roasted chestnuts, decadent dessert pairings and educational winery tours, the festival serves up plenty for every taste.
The 2009 event kicked off with the Xerox Icewine Gala at the glamorous Fallsview Casino. This spectacular evening showcased wine from more than 30 of Ontario’s premier wineries. Local vineyards are also popular destinations during the festival. A designated driver is recommended, or take the shuttle bus that’s included with the purchase of an Icewine Festival Discovery Pass ($30 per person gets you to six vineyards of your choice for samples and pairings). Without the pass, most pairings cost $10 each.
Going to extremes
Icewine production is often referred to as extreme winemaking. Grapes are left on the vine until December or January. Once the temperatures drop below -8 to -13 degrees Celsius, icewine pickers arrive, often to harvest the frozen clusters in the dead of night. The precious grapes are immediately pressed in the extreme cold to extract the nectar. In this process, the water content in each grape remains frozen in crystals, leaving only a few coveted drops of concentrated, intense liquid. Icewine yields are a mere 10 to 15% of an average table-wine harvest. Slowly fermented over the coming months, this delicate nectar will eventually become icewine—intense, sweet and sumptuous. Renowned for fruit flavours ranging from mango to peach to lychee, icewine is truly a natural wonder and extreme winemaking at its best.
Icewine Classic Weekend
The second weekend of the festival included a special package: the Icewine Classic Weekend Experience. This all-inclusive weekend included two nights of luxury accommodation at the Pillar and Post, entrance to all Niagara Icewine Festival activities and an exclusive Classic Program of Events. My partner and I opted for this package, which began Friday evening with the Grand Tasting Gala featuring 19 local wineries and an array of delicious edibles.
One of our most interesting wine discoveries at the gala was a 2006 Malbec from Niagara’s Legends Winery. It had many of the qualities of its Argentinean counterpart, but featured a lighter, greener mouthfeel. We also tasted a 2007 Riverview Cellars Winery Cabernet Sauvignon icewine that reminded us of candied apples.
The evening’s showstopper, however, was a 1999 Vidal Icewine from Mountain Road Wine Company, a small winery based in Beamsville, a 15-minute drive from downtown Niagara-on-the-Lake. I can best describe the 1999 Vidal Icewine only as liquid toffee. It was their first commercial offering and a gold medal winner in 2000 for the Best Sweet White Wine at the World International Competition in Ottawa. We were thrilled to find that the 1999 vintage was still available for a modest $39.95.
Feeling quite warm and satisfied after having nibbled on duck-filled crepes, gnocchi in beef broth, and poached pear and cambazola, we climbed aboard a double-decker bus that whisked us to the après event on Queen Street in historic downtown Niagara-on-the-Lake. There we witnessed the official unveiling of the festival’s Icewine Lounge, complete with armchairs and cocktail tables carved from ice. Listening to the Julia Dunn Jazz Trio, we sipped specialty icewine martinis and enjoyed icewine truffles and a selection of wonderful desserts—a sweet ending to the evening.
On tour
The next morning, my partner and I started the day with a visit to Inniskillin Wineries—a true Niagara wine pioneer. On July 31, 1975, Inniskillin Wines and its founders Karl J. Kaiser and Donald J.P. Ziraldo were granted Ontario’s first winery license since prohibition. Over the years, Ziraldo and Kaiser have kept standards high and produced wines that garnered the attention of the international wine world. The winery has taken home more than its share of awards, participated in wine shows such as Vinexpo and Vinitaly, and seen its product stocked on the shelves and wine lists of fine stores and restaurants around the world. Inniskillin icewine even found its way into the cellars of the Imperial Palace of Japan.
Our visit to Inniskillin introduced us to several icewines including a sparkling Vidal variety with floral notes and flavors of mango and apricot. Its texture was similar to other sparkling wines, such as Champagne or Asti, but with a fuller body and a significantly higher sugar level balanced with high acidity. We enjoyed our icewine with French toast and maple-syrup pecans prepared by celebrity chef Anna Olson and served on the tasting room’s strikingly unusual tabletops, fashioned from the reclaimed wood floor of an Austrian glass factory. Anna, star of the Food Network’s Fresh was also on hand to sign copies of her books Sugar and A Second Cup of Sugar.
Before leaving Inniskillin, we had a chance to walk through the vineyards to pick and taste some of the few remaining grapes directly off the vine. Then we were back on the shuttle and headed to our next destination: Edgewaters Tap & Grill in Niagara Falls.
As we took in the restaurant’s spectacular panoramic view of both the American and Horseshoe Falls, our group was greeted by Micheal Fagan, the Liquor Control Board of Ontario’s (LCBO’s) product consultant and matchmaker for Food and Drink magazine. This interactive luncheon featured celebrity chefs Roger Mooking (Toronto’s Kultura and Nyood), Jason Parsons (Niagara’s Pellar Estates) and Anthony Sedlak (Host of The Main on Canada’s Food Network). Each chef was challenged to use icewine in each dish. The results were spectacular, particularly Parson’s trio of desserts, which included roasted apple with cinnamon and topped with a Blue Benedictine cheese that’s blended with three full bottles or Riesling icewine. Pellar’s executive chef paired his desserts with the estate’s 2000 Vidal Icewine.
Nice ice
Some of Jason Parson’s icewine recipes are available on the Pellar Estates website.
The remainder of the afternoon was spent visiting a variety of wineries. Some taste-worthy stops included:
Château des Charmes
The story of Château des Charmes begins more than five generations ago with a family that traces its roots to both the Alsace region of France and the vineyards of French Algeria. We tasted three different Rieslings, the Niagara region’s most versatile grape: a crisp, dry 2006 Riesling, a sweet 2006 Late Harvest Riesling with aromas of citrus and tropical fruit, and finally the 2007 Riesling Icewine that was judged “Best Icewine Worldwide” at the 2008 International Wine & Spirit Competition in London, England.
Hillebrand Winery
For more than 30 years, Hillebrand has been making fine VQA wines in Niagara. They created the region’s first icewine in 1983. At this year’s festival, our group was treated to a perfect winter cocktail called Trius Kiss, made with the estate’s icewine, hot chocolate and a rosette of whipped cream, and paired with a delicate pink icewine macaroon.
Flat Rock Cellars
Founded in 1999 on a spectacular piece of the Niagara escarpment known as the Jordan Bench, Flat Rock occupies a gently rolling slope studded with vines. The winery building is a distinctive, hexagonal, glass-encased masterpiece. For the festival, Flat Rock organized a Skate and Bake where visitors don ice skates, glide across the winery’s pond and warm-up by an open-air fire while roasting icewine marshmallows.
Reif Estate Winery
The Reif family began winemaking nearly half a millennium ago in the small town of Neustadt, located in Germany’s Rhine River Valley. In 1977, the family crossed the Atlantic, and patriarch Ewald Reif purchased a plot of land on the fertile banks of the Niagara River. For the festival, Reif made a delightful pairing of adult-friendly S’mores with a 2006 Vidal Icewine.
Coyote’s Run Estate Winery
Located on a 58-acre vineyard outside the town of St. David’s in Niagara-on-the-Lake, the estate has planted approximately 25 acres of its property with varieties such as Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Syrah, Vidal and Pinot Gris. Our group was treated to the unusual but flavorful pairing of a 2007 Riesling Icewine with Malaysian-style braised pork on Naan bread.
Winemaker’s dinner
The highlight of the weekend was Saturday evening’s Winemaker’s Dinner Series. With a choice of six dinners, my partner and I selected Pillitteri Estates Winery & Mountain Road Wine Company featuring Chef Eric Peacock from Niagara’s Wellington Court restaurant. We were an intimate group of 16 people seated in the Pillitteri Estates tasting room. Our hosts were the festival’s co-chair and president of Mike Weir Estate Winery, Barry Katzman, owner and winemaker Steve Kocsis from Mountain Road Wine Company, and Pillitteri Estates’ winemaster, Marc Bradshaw.
After receiving a warm welcome from each of our hosts, we started our much anticipated meal with Hamachi, an ocean fish served ceviche-style with pomelo, coconut and mango, and accompanied by a 2006 Mountain Road Wine Company Dry Riesling. Our second course was wild mushroom and Parmesan risotto with porcini-poached chicken and truffle foam. Chef Eric explained that he cooks the chicken in water and herbs for precisely 14 minutes and then lets the chicken rest in a covered pot for several hours. The dish was paired with a tantalizing, crisp-tasting 2007 Pillitteri Estates Sur Lie Chardonnay.
If this had been a blind tasting, I never would have guessed this wine to be a Chardonnay. The Sur Lie tricks many tastebuds. The term literally means “on the lees,” and generally refers to the aging of wines on the deposit of dead yeast that forms after primary fermentation. It’s a practice that imparts a toasty quality and enhances complexity without the oak.
The main course was bacon-wrapped veal tenderloin, with a fava bean fricassee, red-wine reduction and baby turnip paired with a 2002 Pillitteri Estates Family Reserve Trivalente. The Trivalente was an amazing choice for the veal. A full-bodied, Bordeaux-style blend of Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon, the Trivalente boasted powerful spicy aromas of black pepper, chocolate, cinnamon and nutmeg complemented by ripe berry and black fruits. A local cheese course followed, featuring roasted pecans and rosemary-infused honey. Again, the match was brilliant thanks to a 2005 Mountain Road Wine Company Botrytis-affected Riesling.
Guests were invited to take a short walk to enjoy dessert served in the Pilliteri barrel cellar. White chocolate tart with a hazelnut crust and red fruit compote was paired with two different icewines, the first a 2007 Pillitteri Estates Cabernet Franc Icewine that matched the fruit compote beautifully; the 1999 Mountain Road Wine Company Vidal Icewine, of which my partner and I were already big fans, simply made the tart come to life.
Intrigued by a set of modern metal chairs hanging on the wall, we were told that founders and proprietors Gary and Lena Pillitteri commissioned the creation of 23 stainless steel chairs for their barrel cellar. Throughout his life, combinations of twos and threes have been significant and auspicious for Gary. November 23rd was the day he left his native Sicily and arrived in Canada. His wife Lena celebrates her birthday on December 23rd. Their eldest child, Connie, was born on September 23rd, and their other daughter Lucy was born on February 23rd. Charles, their son, is the third child and was born on the second of August.
Despite the rapid growth and recent expansion of the Pillitteri Estate’s Winery, the family has not forgotten its heritage. The Pillitteri logo features a Sicilian cart, called a carretto, which is intricately painted with scenes of Pillitteri ancestors. The carretto represents the history of a family whose roots are deep in the cultivation of the land and the making of wine. The original antique, a cherished family heirloom, is proudly displayed in the winery’s reception area. A second family carretto can be found in the Canadian Museum of Civilization in Ottawa, Canada.
As we ended our weekend with a bubbly Sunday brunch, my partner and I pondered some of the festival highlights: passionate winemakers, incredible food, beautiful Niagara winter scenes and the critically acclaimed icewine distilled from summer’s bounty. Although we were chilled by the -20 degrees Celsius temperatures, we were also thoroughly warmed by the festival experience. We’ll be back!
Thank you for the interesting article.