Winemaker's Notes
Despite our Chardonnay usually undergoing a long, slow indigenous malolactic fermentation and aging on yeast lees for many, many months, it is rarely described as ‘buttery.’ Interestingly, for the first time, this vintage did not undergo this transformation, possibly due to the chemistry of the wine due to the very cool vintage. It tastes great, with a bit more verve and cut than usual. It’s a nice slight detour from our usual result.
Very focused, chiseled Chardonnay fruit with green apple at the fore. There’s lemon-lime as well. There’s also a bit of jasmine lurking as well and a tad of vanilla. On the mouth, it is quite juicy-almost like the rosé in attack. Despite two years on lees, there is a sense of leanness and crispness throughout. This was the style I had initially envisioned for this site with our first vintage of it in 1997. But I had decided to see if it would hold up to the full-on complexity treatment with the malolactic fermentation. It did then and has been quite successful ever since. This year, nature had other plans and handed us an opportunity to explore and learn.
