German Ice Wine

The most notable dessert wine in Germany is their German ice wine or “eiswein”, made from grapes that have frozen on the vine.

Since most of the moisture from these grapes is left behind as ice, eiswein grapes yield a very heavy concentration of sweetness and acidity. This sweet German dessert wine will typically be very clear and crisp.

When his staff decided to pick and process the grapes anyway, the result was eiswein. At the time it was called “winter wine” and it remained Germany’s secret until 1962.

Eiswein may not be produced every year as the winters must be cold enough for the grapes to freeze. Natural ice wine requires the temperature in Germany to be a minimum of −7 °C (19 °F).

The most common type of eiswein in Germany is produced from the Riesling grape. Some ice wine from Germany have an alcohol content as low as 6%.

There is much debate over whether ice wines improve with age.

Even though Germany began the eiswein tradition, Canada is now the largest producer of ice wines worldwide.

The largest importer is Asia.

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