According to a recent New York Times report, warming winter almost cut off the sweet wine tradition in Germany. As covered in our first class, to yield the concentrated juice the ice wine style requires, water in the grapes must be frozen solid. It means that they need to be harvested after several hours of temperatures at or below 19 degrees Fahrenheit, usually in the very early morning. While climate change is causing uncertain and chaotic weather worldwide, Germany has experienced a clear trend toward warmer winters. This is extremely bad news for ice wine makers. The trade group German Wine Institute concluded recently that there would be no 2019 German vintage of ice wine due to mild winter. Last week, it updated that one vineyard, Weingut Zimmerle, close to Stuttgart in the country’s south, was lucky enough to have made a small amount, about 100 liters, or 26 gallons. While that amount is historically tiny, it might be a harbinger of future harvests if weather trends continue.
The dearth has led to a spike in prices, with a half-bottle of ice wine from the Schloss Vollrads going for at least 100 euros, or roughly $110. This has sparked an interesting dilemma for the winemakers. The rarity encourages vintners to keep trying to produce the wine, despite increasingly difficult conditions, but most of them ended up watching the grapes go to waste.
Thanks for sharing this, Querida!
ReplyDeleteI'm interested in what these wineries will do with these grapes in the meantime. They're already planted, and even though they didn't freeze, aren't they still ripe? What's the highest and best use for these grapes that weren't able to be used in Plan A?
I think Germany could unfortunately be a "canary in the coal mine" for other ice wine makers elsewhere given that others are likely to also experience warmer winters in the future. If I made ice wine elsewhere, I would be paying close attention - and making sure that I had a sense of what my Plan B would be.