March 1, 2020
A warm winter means that for the first time in years Germany’s vineyards will produce no ice wine — a pricey, golden nectar made from grapes that have been left to freeze on the vine.
The German Wine Institute said Sunday that none of the country’s wine regions saw the necessary low temperature of minus 7 degrees Celsius, or 19 degrees Fahrenheit.
A succession of warm winters has cut into ice wine production recently, the institute said, noting that in 2017 only seven producers managed to make it, and only five managed it in 2013. The institute, the wine industry’s marketing arm, didn’t say how far back records went.
“If warm winters become more frequent over the coming years, ice wines from Germany’s regions will soon become an even more expensive rarity than they already are,” said wine institute spokesman Ernst Buescher
Freezing the grapes before they are crushed concentrates the sugar and leads to an intensely sweet, golden wine often served with dessert. It has always been a niche product with around 0.1% of German production and expensive due to low volumes.
https://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/ice-wine-warm-winter-nixes-german-wine-production-69320709
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