Inniskillin Okanagan Vineyards Winery

Inniskillin is one of the largest icewine producers in Canada, if not the largest, producing icewine primarily from its vineyards in Ontario. Much of this wine sells at duty-free shops around the globe. With a smaller vineyard base, the Inniskillin sister winery in the Okanagan makes smaller volumes, and these icewines are seldom seen in export markets. A pity for icewine lovers since Inniskillin Okanagan is a very accomplished producer.

Sandor Mayer, the winemaker, took his training in his native Hungary in table wines, not dessert wines. Here, he mentored with Inniskillin co-founder Karl Kaiser and with other winemakers in the Vincor group, which now owns Inniskillin. In the 2006 vintage, he had the additional advantage that the hard freeze settled on the Okanagan in the third week of November when there were still lots of healthy grapes on the vines. Early freezes yield abundant volumes of clean and fresh icewines.

This Riesling has aromas and flavours of apricots and ripe pineapples. The wine shows an intense purity of fruit strung onto a taut tightrope of racy acidity. The balance is perfect: the abundant sweetness (not disclosed) is offset by the acidity and the wine has a crisp and refreshing finish that goes on and on. 94 points.

Reviewed March 12, 2008 by John Schreiner.