After breakfast, we took off to the Peller Estates Winery. The Niagara Escarpment has a micro climate that is ideal for growing gapes, and the area specializes in creating icewine. To make icewine, the growers wait until the grapes have frozen on the vine before picking them, and then the grapes are pressed while still frozen. The resulting wine is very sweet and ideal for serving with desserts (or as the dessert). We tasted three of Peller's icewines, and came away with bottles of their Cabernet Franc (a red icewine!) and Riseling icewines. The Vidal was too sweet for our tastes.
Living so close to Ontario, I think of icewine as something that is fairly easy to get, but it is apparently rare and expensive in other parts of the world. Large numbers of Japanese tourists finance their trips abroad by coming to Niagara-on-the-Lake, buying up bottles of icewine, and reselling them at home for up to $300/bottle Canadian!
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