The discovery of icewine happened when a producer on Franconia, Germany made virtue of necessity by pressing from frozen, apparently ruined, grapes in 1794. Legend has it that the owner of the vineyard was out of town when he should have been at home harvesting his grapes.
Upon returning from his protracted break, he and his staff decided to pick and process the frost-damaged crop. The result was icewine. He was amazed by the high sugar concentration of the jucie.amd the quality of the wine produced, which he labeled ‘winter wine’.
The icewine remained Germany’s secret until 1962, when it was produced commercially throughout Europe.
A German immigrant, Walter Hainle settled his family in Canada, dabbled in home winemaking with grapes from a friend’s vineyard. When an unusually early frost snapped across the vineyard in 1973, Hainle opportunistically made an icewine.
Hainle was joined by his son, Tilman and they received their winery licennce in 1988. By 1995 Hainle became Canada’s first winery certified as an organic producer
Canada is the world’s largest producer of icewine. The majority of Canadian ice wines are made from the hybrid Vidal.
History of ice wine