Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2018 Chardonnay Yamhill-Carlton offers singular aromas of green pineapple and herbs layered with beeswax, roasted almonds and saline. The delicately styled, silken palate reveals itself slowly, offering more savory and nutty nuances with time, and it finishes very long and lifted.
Rating: 94+ -
James Suckling
Aromas of mint, nutmeg and baked lemon. Medium-bodied with a supple texture. Delicate and steady with lovely length. Slight nutty character comes through. Elegant. Refreshing finish.
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Wine Enthusiast
This is a smooth, medium-ripe wine that's been fermented and aged in 20% new puncheons. The mouthfeel is firm—almost glossy— with tight apple and pear fruit. There are hints of honeysuckle, jicama and a bright pine-needle note shining through.
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Wine Spectator
Vibrant and minerally, with sleek nectarine and apple flavors that are framed by a rich and supple texture.
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.
Yamhill-Carlton, characterized by pastoral, rolling hills composed of shallow, quick-draining, ancient marine soil, is ideal for Pinot noir and other cool-climate-loving varieties. It is in the rain shadow of the Coast Range to its west, whose highest point climbs to an altitude of 3,500 feet. Yamhill-Carlton is actually surrounded by mountains on three sides: Chehalem Mountains to the north, the Dundee Hills to the east and the western Coast Range to its west, which, when it lets Pacific air through, serves to cool the region.
Vineyards grow on the ridges surrounding the two small communities of Yamhill and Carlton and cover about 1,200 acres of this 60,000 acre region, which roughly makes a horse-shoe shape on a map.