This week’s unwelcome return of winter got me thinking about ice wine. Now, the Niagara ice wine harvest has been finished for several months — it began in December — but had we not had proper conditions yet by late March, the industry would be facing a disaster. It’s been a very long time since we talked about ice wine in the abstract. Some 20 years ago, it became the “engine” driving the emergence of Ontario wines in the domestic public conscience. That was due largely to the success ice wines were having in putting the province on the global wine radar.