Winemaker Notes
Focused, fresh and bright. The 2019 Skycrest Vineyard Chardonnay offers fresh yellow peach, apricot and pear fruit notes alongside subtle tarragon and lemon blossom. A minerality runs through the palate balancing the wine along with a laser-focused acidity that highlights the incredible texture and produces an exceptionally long finish.
Professional Ratings
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Vinous
The 2019 Chardonnay Skycrest is a knockout. Bright, floral and energetic, the 2019 is wonderfully detailed and nuanced. Lemon confit, almond, sage, mint and dried flowers lend striking complexity. The 2019 is wonderfully vibrant and sculpted, with exceptional balance, the 2019 is an absolute winner.
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Wine Enthusiast
Subtle almond, dried apple and butter flavors fill up this medium-bodied, smooth-textured wine, giving it a mellow complexity along with good, juicy cider notes and balancing acidity. Aged 16 months in 30% new oak barrels.
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Jeb Dunnuck
Aged 15 months (as are the red wines) in 30% new French oak, the nose of the 2019 Chardonnay Skycrest Vineyard has some depth, with toasted brioche, green apple skin, and lemon curd. The palate is soft while maintaining a core of acidity and energy, and it is floral with fresh white flowers.
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Wine Spectator
Tensile, with concentrated white plum, dried sage and preserved citrus flavors that are bound by focused acidity. Saline accents linger with meringue notes on the finish. Drink now through 2024. 515 cases made.
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.
Surrounded by redwood forests and often blanketed in chilly, ocean fog, the Anderson Valley is one of California’s most picturesque appellations. During the growing season, moist, cool, late afternoon air flows in from the Pacific Ocean along the Navarro River and over the valley's golden, oak-studded hills. High and low temperatures can vary as much as 40 or 50 degrees within a single day, allowing for slow and gentle ripening of grapes, which will in turn create elegantly balanced wines.
The Anderson Valley is best known for Pinot Noir made in a range of styles from delicate and floral to powerful and concentrated. Chardonnay also shines here, and both varieties are often utilized for the production of some of California’s best traditional method sparkling wines. The region also draws inspiration from Alsace and produces excellent Riesling, Gewürztraminer, Pinot Blanc and Pinot Gris.