Sometimes an idea, a gesture, a word just hits the collective unconscious. For the last few holiday seasons, the words "ice wine" have buzzed loudest in the world of drinking. When I worked in a wine shop, I always spent more time talking about ice wine than selling it, and few people wanted ice wine after I talked to them. Customers may be intrigued by the idea of ice wine, but they lack real information (cough, cough, in-flight magazines, cough). This happens quite a bit in the wine business. Thus, whatever I was saying about ice wine (the truth) unsells the stuff. So why not change my sales pitch? Damn propriety.

The truth is, 95 times out of 100, unless it says Canada, Germany, or Austria, it ain't ice wine. I'm not going to get technical on you: Ice wine is not a difficult concept, just a tradition wrapped in a scheme and surrounded by marketing blather. Ice wine is not about the ice; it's about the other stuff that happens to the grapes in the winter that makes a true ice wine. Primarily, the grapes need to be frozen on the vine by mother nature. But unfortunately, in America, there are few rules to say what a winery has to do to put "ice wine" on its label. That's the kicker, and this semantically loose attitude misses the whole point. No magic happens if all you have is a bunch of frozen grapes — the grapes have to undergo a much more intense process.

Now, travel to the Rheinland. It's October. Winemakers pick grapes for regular harvest, noticing grapes affected by botrytis, an infection that causes the fruit to shrivel and lose its water. Basically, it partially raisinates them. While all of this is happening, the freezing temperatures preserve the grapes. So by December, the wineries have dried, frozen grapes on the vines.

Ice wine grapes.

The difference between these frozen, raisin grapes and normal frozen grapes is this: if you press the normal frozen grapes, you get a glass of grape juice, but if you press the frozen raisins, you get a tiny amount of uber-concentrated syrup. If you made wine out of these two things, which wine would be the more complex? The most concentrated? The raisins. When you sip it, the ice wine should make your entire face react. The balance between that hyper-intense sweetness and equally insane acidity should cause your eye to twitch, your hair to stand on end, and your neck to shudder. The saliva glands in the back of your mouth will convulse.

That's the difference between most American-marketed "ice wines" and the good stuff, and that's why the good stuff costs more of the green stuff. Good ice wine requires more time, more grapes, and more labor, and it has more flavor. That's why I never changed my sales pitch. If you just want sweet, you can do it a lot cheaper with faux ice wine. In fact, most people who think they've had an ice wine have really just had a dessert wine. Part of the problem with American ice wine is that you don't tell it to happen — it tells you. The weather has to be right to make ice wine in the U.S. Washington state and the Finger Lakes area of New York are both capable of making ice wine, for example, but only in certain years.

I put my explanation of ice wine to the test in a recent tasting. Here are my notes to self:

Covey Run "Barrel Select" Riesling "Ice Wine," Washington — A little complex, still missing that essential acidity — no reaction in my saliva glands. The fruit flavors are light — a little citrus, a bit of apple. They don't seem to feel thick enough on my tongue. It's still not ice wine, but as a dessert wine on the shelf for $13 to $15, it's an awesome value.

Mission Hill Riesling Ice Wine, Canada — OK, now we're getting to it — acidity! I feel my mouth water as this wine moves around in my mouth. It tastes like concentrated nectarine, not as cloying as some of the peachier dessert wines — it's got a zingy lime edge to it and a great aroma, like wild honey. I get the intensity, the balance, and a little shudder.

J.u.H.A. Strub Niersteiner Paterberg Riesling Eiswein — With a name like that, it has to be German. Technically the sweetest of the group by half, the Strub doesn't taste like it. Rich, laser-beam strength, unripe pineapple fruit, with hints of 47 other things I wrote down. Honeycomb, lemon, mango, a field of flowers, and an entire English garden are stuck inside this bottle. The acidity hits me full on. My eye involuntarily closes, and I get goose bumps and auto-salivation. Yep, this is the stuff.

Anyone can tell the difference when tasting a traditional ice wine and knock-off side by side. I tasted these wines recently at an event with a mixed group of wine lovers and novices, and I saw the revelation in everyone's eyes. But because of false advertising and cheap "made in China" knock-offs, most people never end up trying the real stuff. That's why I object to any old frozen grapes being called ice wine — the same way it's not right that California bucket wine uses the phrase "Mountain Burgundy." When you use these names in a manner that doesn't befit the original, you cheapen them, and that's not fair. Look: Restaurants don't pan fry a cube steak and call it filet mignon, do they? You'd be pissed, right? And it doesn't make it better if they sell it for less — we'd never know when to expect the good stuff and when to not.

Maggie Savarino Dutton is an industry veteran who has played bartender, sommelier and line cook and who now consults. She writes "Search & Distill," which appears every Wednesday in the Seattle Weekly, and maintains The Wine Offensive, her blog about wine, food, and anything else that might be discussed over the bar.

Ice grapevines photo by Martin Cathrae via Flickr (Creative Commons), ice wine grapes photo by mya! via Flickr (Creative Commons), "Planet of the Grapes" photograph from Getty Images, "Bottle" photograph from istockphoto.com.