Winemaker Notes
Matchbook’s 2018 The Arsonist Chardonnay is a luscious blend of the best barrel lots of estate-grown fruit. A beautiful golden straw color opens to aromas of toasty oak, crème brûlèe, brown sugar, and mango. Dense flavors of pineapple, caramel apples, and baking spices are layered over creamy buttery notes and a touch of vanilla. This is a full-bodied Chardonnay loaded with opulent flavors that are well integrated and balanced.
The Arsonist Chardonnay has enough depth of flavor to hold up to lobster, pasta with a cream sauce and, for the adventurous, a well-marbled steak.
Professional Ratings
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Wilfred Wong of Wine.com
COMMENTARY: The 2018 Matchbook The Arsonist Chardonnay is packed, elevated, and delicious. TASTING NOTES: This wine brings ripe fruit, oak, and butterscotch to the fore. Pair it with a crispy-batter, minute steak. (Tasted: June 4, 2020, San Francisco, CA)
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Tasting Panel
Smooth and velvety with nice depth and balance; rich and complex yet subtle, with notes of vanilla, new oak, and ripe (but not heavy) fruit culminating in a long and generous finish.
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.
Mitigated by mild Sacramento River Delta breezes, the Dunnigan Hills appellation is in the northwest portion of Yolo County and has a Mediterranean climate.