Winemaker Notes
Exceptional. Spiced orchard fruits, citrus, brioche, and toasty oak as well as hints of nuttiness all emerge. The palate grips with crushed rock minerality giving frame to the stone fruit and citrus flavors. Medium-bodied and well structured, it has bright acidity and a clean, vibrant, pure style that's going to gain richness and depth with a year or two of bottle age and keep for a decade.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
Clean and mineral-driven aromas of chalk, crushed rock and bright citrus make for an excellent nose on this classic bottling from a classic vineyard. The palate offers honeydew and honeysuckle flavors, but it's the chalky texture that's most compelling, carrying through into an almond and coconut finish.
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Jeb Dunnuck
Moving to the Chardonnays, the 2020 Chardonnay Sanford & Benedict Vineyard has a terrific nose of stone fruits, charcoal, honeyed flowers, and spicy wood. Rich, medium to full-bodied, with bright acidity, it's a classic Au Bon Climat Chardonnay that readers will love. It will evolve for 10-12 years if well stored.
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.
Ranging from cool and foggy in the west to warm and dry in the east, the Santa Ynez Valley is a climatically diverse growing area. The most expansive AVA within the larger Santa Barbara County region, Santa Ynez is also home to a wide variety of soil types and geographical features. The appellation is further divided into four distinct sub-AVAs—Sta. Rita Hills, Ballard Canyon, Los Olivos District and Happy Canyon—each with its own defining characteristics.
A wide selection of grapes is planted here—more than sixty different varieties, and counting. Chardonnay and Pinot Noir dominate in the chilly west, while Zinfandel, Rhône blends, and Bordeaux blends rule the arid east. Syrah is successful at both ends of the valley, with a lean and peppery, Old-World sensibility closer to the coast and lush berry fruit further inland.