Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
-
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2017 Chardonnay Richard Dinner Vineyard charges forth with notes of spiced apples, pear tart and brioche with touches of butterscotch, lime blossoms and coriander seed plus a waft of mandarin peel. Medium to full-bodied, the palate is still very tightly wound, with a compelling backbone of freshness cutting through the intense citrus and savory layers, finishing long and mineral laced.
Rating: 96+ -
James Suckling
This is oily and very rich with a thick and creamy palate. Full-bodied, big and flamboyant. If you want a wild and wonderful chardonnay, this is your bottle. Drink now.
-
Connoisseurs' Guide
Here is a Chardonnay that conveys riveting and altogether unrelenting richness, but, even if big and bold, it never once inclines to unwieldy excess and possesses exceptional balance for a wine of its substance and size. It is very full-bodied and close to fleshy in feel and, while loaded with sweet oak, is governed at every point by sure and sustained, optimally ripened fruit. Although so showy and enthralling as to make memorable drinking in the near term, it has room for a few years of positive growth, but, whether enjoyed now or later, it is one to pair with appropriately rich and flavorful foods.
One of the most popular and versatile white wine grapes, Chardonnay offers a wide range of flavors and styles depending on where it is grown and how it is made. While it tends to flourish in most environments, Chardonnay from its Burgundian homeland produces some of the most remarkable and longest lived examples. California produces both oaky, buttery styles and leaner, European-inspired wines. Somm Secret—The Burgundian subregion of Chablis, while typically using older oak barrels, produces a bright style similar to the unoaked style. Anyone who doesn't like oaky Chardonnay would likely enjoy Chablis.
Defined more by altitude than geographical outline, the Sonoma Mountain appellation occupies elevations between 400 and 1,200 feet on the northern and eastern slopes of the actual Sonoma Mountain and is part of the greater Sonoma Valley appellation. The mountain reaches 2,400 feet; its hills separate the cooling winds of Petaluma Gap from the Sonoma Valley.
On a cooler western flank, Pinot noir, Chardonnay and Syrah enjoy a great deal of success. Vineyards on its warmer, eastern side, interspersed with heavily forested areas, tend to include Cabernet Sauvignon, Sauvignon Blanc, Zinfandel, and Syrah. Given its complexity of topography and mesoclimates, Sonoma Mountain excels with a wide range of grape varieties.