Excerpts from the book “Art Château – vol. 2 – Vernissage with Ice Wine”

The refreshingly sweet ice wine is a very special treat originating in Germany and Austria. Its production process is an interesting story. Only grapes frozen naturally on the vine may be used for the Dionysian drink, forcing growers out to harvest in icy cold weather. Going down the Rhine, you reach a point behind Koblenz where the grapes start feeling uncomfortable. At the steep slopes above Leutesdorf, where the water drains through swiftly, their roots start clawing 15 meters deep into the poor, stony soil. In the vaults of the vineyards around here, 40-year-old wines are kept behind heavy wooden doors. Looking down the vertiginous vineyards, the river and the town come into view. In the background, way up high, squats Hammerstein Castle, while down below, the picturesque landscape of the Rhine Valley with its hoarfrost cover rings in the Christmas season.

Ice Wine usually hits the stage for Christmas or New Year’s

The old walls of the castle ruin are steeped in the fateful events of distant centuries. The castle rock looks dramatic, like the very foundation of the marital drama that took place in this location. Otto von Hammerstein’s wife was a beautiful woman. He is said to have been “mad with love”. Even when their holy bond became the target of power political struggles and people in high places did their best to pull them apart, he remained true to her until the end. A path mostly used by wine growers leads up to the castle. After its long chivalrous history, the ruin has fallen into a deep sleep worthy of fairy tale dreams, while the river lying at its feet continues to unfurl its picture book blues. Tracing the trails of the boats below, the mind starts exploring what lies behind the term “Romanticism” and is drawn towards Heinrich Heine’s Loreley. As evening descends, the river’s golden glow stirs up associations of Christmas decorations – and ice wine. Waves of longing well up. Myths and legends nod their heads: The Romantic Rhine keepings flowing all the way to Bingen. Castles and citadels once home to noble kings and princes grace its shores making travelers feel like a white ship is waiting for them to embark.

The text and the poems in this post are excerpts from the book “Art Château, Vol. 2 – Vernissage with Ice Wine“.

Where the rocky valley of the river Nahe meets the Rhine, a new kingdom unfolds. This is where the ice wine vintners rule. No matter how impressively Orion rings in the winter season in the first icy November nights, the nine vintners in this region have no time for stargazing. Instead, while the other 170 wine growers around them are still sound asleep, they restlessly check the temperature. When, after long autumn rains, the temperatures drop, and it’s nothing but blue skies all of a sudden, they will have brought another treasure into their vaults. The bouquets and aromas waiting to burst forth from it rouse memories of a distant country where the sun is shining and the sky is just as blue as that of a typical maturing ice wine harvest day.

No constellation in the sky can tell the vintners whether this will be the day. While the dreamy wine making villages near the river Nahe are still sleeping, they are eagerly observing other natural events. Wide awake, equipped with flashlights and thermometers, they go out to touch the grapes and feel how hard the frost has made them. Experience tells them where they need to go: if the grapes are frozen here, the entire vineyard may be harvested. They have learned first-hand that the temperatures down by the river are the same as those on the vineyard on the opposite shore. All is silent, the only sound being the quiet gurgle of the river, above which floats a veil of mist. At 5 am, the thermometer shows minus 7 degrees Celsius – almost there. Depending on the sugar concentration, the grapes start freezing around minus 7 degrees. The colder and starrier the night, they say, the better the ice wine. At dawn, the grapes are covered with bizarre ice crystals and glitter like baubles.

Then, at 6 am, suddenly clouds appear. “Shall we call it off?”, everyone wonders. Clouds are like a warming cover that descends upon the landscape. And the slightest breeze is deadly for the grapes. The cold air accumulating on the ground starts mingling with warmer layers of air. Perfect conditions would be absolutely no wind, a clear, starry sky, and 11-12 degrees Celsius below zero. The frost-veiled ice wine plots are dozing in the dawning valley. This vineyard must be further down – the cold air sinks down. It’s all about microclimate. 100 meters further down, no ice wine can be harvested. The mountain in the East is like a sunshade: when the winter sun stands low, it keeps casting its shadow on the vines till 10 am. One grape known to be especially suited to ice wine production is Riesling. The high quality of the grapes makes it possible to leave them on the vine for long periods of time without being damaged.

Some haiku poems from the book:

Winter

Against the blue sky
Bare vines emanate the scent
Of sunlight on rocks.

Looking like fairies
The trees by the old castle
Wearing white hoarfrost.

Nuances of sound
And ochre sloping across
The wilted vineyard.

The lanterns on the
Ancient walls snuggling up to
The hoarfrosted leaves.

Up on the vineyard
The castle’s battlements crowned
By an azure sky.

Sources: Please see the authors, poet and bibliography in the above link to the online book (imprint at the end of the book)!