WBW #27 ROUNDUP: Ice Ice Baby!

It's been a pleasure to host this edition of Wine Blogging Wednesdays, founded by Lenndevours. A big thank you to all WBW #27: Icy Desserts participants who ponied up for a bottle of ice wine and shared your thoughts and stories. You all blogged from Australia, Canada, Germany, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the USA. I learned a lot for this. For starters, I never knew there were so many wine blogs out there in the wide world of the Internet sharing their knowledge and experiences with wine. Oenology is an intimidating field to "wine newbies", you all help make it more approachable and fun.

I originally thought about organizing the entries by country of origin for the wines, but some of us couldn't help tasting more than one ice wine, which would have made it hard to decide where to list each entry. So I've gone back to the standby of listing entries as they came into my mailbox. (I'll double-check my mailbox. If I missed someone or got a detail wrong please don't hesitate to contact me at [email protected] and I'll add you in.)

With that we kick off this round up with "snekse" from Gastronomic Fight Club, who is no stranger to ice wine, but rather than pull out a familiar bottle decided to shop for something new and discovered the 2003 Covey Run Semillon Reserve Ice Wine from Washington, USA.

On the East Coast Neil of Brooklynguy's Wine and Food Blog, a fellow alum of my own great alma mater (Go Blue!), samples a trio of ice wines from the Finger Lake Region of New York. (2005 Hunt Country Vidal Ice Wine, 2005 Casa Larga Fiori Delle Stelle Vidal Ice Wine, and 2004 Standing Stone Vidal Ice Wine)

Down in the Southern Hemisphere, Haalo from Cook (almost) Anything at least once in Melbourne trekked out to the cellar door of Long Gully winery to bring back a bottle of Long Gully 2004 Reserve Ice Riesling, Yarra Valley, Australia.

Marcus of Doktor Weingolb, who hails from Niagara, reaches out of his region and gets the side-benefit of an German language lesson while exploring an Old World eiswine, the Graf Hardegg Riesling Eiswein Steinbugel Seefeld Weinviertel 2002 from Austria. (And gets a headache in the process. Ow!)

We all know how expensive ice wines can be, and finding a good one that doesn't break the bank can be a challenge. Dr Debs at Good Wine Under $20 in Los Angeles, CA, tracked down a budget-friendly ice wine that is readily available and presents to us the 2004 Jackson-Triggs Vidal Icewine Proprietors' Reserve from Ontario, Canada.

Just "a bit" up the coast in San Francisco, Sam of Becks and Posh couldn't resist combining a chocolate tasting with wine tasting, and discovered that a sichuan-flavored chocolate pairs well with 2004 Inniskillin Cabernet Franc Icewine, Ontario, Canada.

Across the continent in New Jersey, Serge of Serge the Concierge takes a unique twist on the theme and introduces us to an ice wine vinegar called Minus 8 Wine Vinegar from Canada. The grapes are picked frozen, just like an ice wine, but processed into vinegar instead of wine and allowed to age.

And back to Melbourne, Australia, where Ed at Tomato experiences divine intervention when pairing 2002 Inniskillin sparkling Vidal ice wine from Ontario Canada with a mango tarte tatin.

In San Francisco, Alder of Vinography introduces us to our first European ice wine of WBW #27, 2001 Weinrieder "Poysdorfer Schneiderberg" Riesling Eiswein, which is from Weinviertel, Austria, a region that has been producing wine since 1194.

Up in the Great White North of Winnipeg (hey, from where I live Winnipeg is part of the Great White North), Manitoba, Canada, Alec of Wine in the 'Peg gets in touch with his Canadian heritage with a bottle of 2004 Inniskillin Vidal Icewine from Ontario Canada.

Columbus Foodie's Becke happily discovers 2003 Frozin from Meeker Vineyards in Sonoma County, California, an icebox wine made — unusually — from zinfandel grapes.

At The Sour Dough, the "Breadchick" out in Massachusetts travels (metaphorically speaking) back to her childhood home of Northern Michigan to sample two Michigan-made ice wines Chateau Grand Traverse 2001 Johannisberg Riesling Ice Wine and the Black Star Farms 2002 A Capella Riesling Ice Wine.

If you've wondered what it's like to bundle up in the middle of the night and harvest grapes under a cold winter night sky, hop across the pond to Heidelberg, Germany, where Thomas of Winzerblog gives us a first hand account of what it is like to pick and press grapes for ice wine.

In what is WBW #27 most unexpected origins for an icebox wine, Ryan and Gabriella of Catavino discover in the 2003 Gramona Penedès Vi de Gel a wine to fall in love with from a Spainish winery.

Garry of Tales of a Sommalier over in the U.K. presents two wines with German ties: CanadaPelee Island Cab Franc Icewine 2001, made by a German winemaker in Ontario Canada, and Bassermann-Jordan Forster Ungeheuer Riesling Icewine 1996 from Germany.

Over in the "Land of 10,000 Lakes" (Minnesota for the rest of us), Tim of Winecast uses the power of the Internet to hunt down an affordable ice wine worth giving a try and fnds 2004 Burgherrn Weinhandels, “Nachtgold”, Eiswein from Germany.

Up in the Finger Lake region of New York, an area I would very much like to visit, Jennifer of Cookin' in the 'Cruse samples this "fruit bomb" of an icewine, 2003 Select Late Harvest Riesling Ice Wine made by Hermann J. Wiemer Vineyards, Finger Lakes Region, New York.

Jack and Joanne of Fork & Bottle in sunny California shares with us 2001 Zeltinger Himmelreich "JUNIOR" Riesling Eiswein from Selbach-Oster Winery, one of their favorite wineries in all of Germany.

Also in California, Dave of Wine Avenue does an Old World/New World ice wine side-by-side comparison. From the Grans-Fassian winery, which was founded in 1624, he tries
2004 Grans-Fassian, Gold Cap Mosel-Saar-Ruwer Leiwener, Riesling Eiswein. And from a 20th century winey the 2004 Jackson-Triggs, Proprietors' Reserve, VQA Niagara Peninsula, Vidal Icewine

Bouncing back to the Down Under, Wino Sapien's Edward and friends give a bottle of 2002 Inniskillin Cabernet Franc Ice Wine a try. As someone who lives driving distance from Inniskillin, I found it interesting to read how much exporting wine to the other side of the world increases the cost, and now I want to see what Australian wines cost here in Michigan.

Catherine of Purple Liquid watched the November 8 election results in California while sipping 2004 Jackson-Triggs Proprietor's Reserve Vidal Icewine from Ontario, Canada.

Also in California, Derrick of An Obsession with Food takes us to one of Europe's newest nations in a region with a very old history in winemaking to taste the 2001 Laski Rizling Ice Wine from Zlati Gric in Slovenia!

Lenn of Lenndevours reviews the "ice-style" Wolffer Estate's 2005 Late Harvest Chardonna, which won "Best Dessert Wine" at the 2006 New York Wine and Food Classic.

Finally, you can read my own entry, which included sampling Lemon Creek Cabernet Sauvignon 2004 from the Lake Michigan Shore Region from my own home state.

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"Culinary Fool" continues the celebratory fashion with her theme for Wine Blogging Wednesday #28: Sparklers Find a non-champagne sparkling wine, check out the "rules" for the event, and post your findings on December 13th.

Comments

[Ryan]

Thanks for hosting and the great write up. I love icewine, time to see if I can find any of these!

[Edward]

Thanks for the write up and the idea of making ice wines the theme.

[sam]

thanks for the round up - I can't wait to curl up with a nice glass of wine and read through all of these.

thanks again for hosting, Kitchen Chick.

[victoria]

Wow, quite a impressive comprahensive list of ice wine and pairings. I am looking forward to find and try a few of them.

[Serge Lescouarnec]

Thanks for the Roundup.

I just started spreading the word about it.

Take care

Serge
Biz:
http://www.njconcierges.com
Blog:

http://www.sergetheconcierge.com

[Dave]

Lisa, your “WBW #27 ROUNDUP: Ice Ice Baby!,’ is now up and linked on AvenueVine:

http://www.avenuevine.com/movabletype/archives/002084.html

Thank you for all your fantastic effort, thoughts and hard work!

Cheers,
Dave

[Derrick Schneider]

You missed mine:
http://www.obsessionwithfood.com/2006_11_01_blog-archive.html#116300263872227301

Thanks for hosting!

[Marcus]

Here's another great ice wine. It's missing from your roundup but this Austrian eiswein is surely not to be missed!

Here's my review of this Riesling.

[Kitchen Chick]

Derrick & marcus, thanks for catching my mistake. I've added you both in to the Round Up.

I really enjoyed reading everyone's entries, and I'm hoping to go back over them again during Thanksgiving break.

[Emily]

Thanks for the great roundup. We wrote up a little article about how Icewines/Eisweins are made, and what constitutes a "true" Ice Wine. It's here, if anybody wants to check it out:
http://www.winemonger.com/catalog/winemonger-talk/icewine/2005/10/19/

Cheers to all!