MacRostie Wildcat Mountain Vineyard Chardonnay 2006

The grapes for this Chardonnay came exclusively from our Wildcat Mountain Vineyard, owned by Steve MacRostie and his partners Nancy and Tony Lilly. Here the vines dig into the sparse volcanic soil and stand firm against the strong winds that race in off of the Pacific Ocean most afternoons. This fog-shrouded mountaintop vineyard is a classic Sonoma Coast site, cool and challenging, and produces wines of great distinction.

WINEMAKING NOTES: The grapes went direct to press as whole clusters. The resulting juice was cold settled, racked off its press lees, and moved directly to barrel for a cool fermentation. The wine was then aged in these same French oak barrels, 25 percent of which were new, for 11 months. The fermentation lees were stirred several times once malolactic conversion was complete, and then the wine was left to slumber. After enough time had passed for the flavors to fully develop, the best barrels from each lot were selected to form the Wildcat Mountain Vineyard blend. The wine was bottled on August 6, 2007.

TASTING NOTES: Classic pale straw in color, with enticing aromas of clover honey and ripe pineapple. On the palate, it offers appealing tropical fruit, citrus, and spiced baked apple flavors. Dry and mouthfilling, this Chardonnay possesses sufficient structure to age for a few years, but is delicious now.