Winemaker Notes
There are aromas of banana custard, fennel bulbs, chamomile flowers and buttered toast that lift from the glass. Oak aging has provided rich crème brûlée, brown spice, and toasty notes. The palate opens with rich textured notes of stone fruit, golden apple pie-a-la mode, papaya, and sweetened cream. Elegant and balanced with balanced with marcona almonds, lavash bread, and a hint of salinity with a long bright finish.
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
Readers looking for a richer, textured, beautifully balanced Chardonnay will love the 2021 Chardonnay Bien Nacido Vineyard, a ripe, seamless effort displaying textbook orchard fruits, plenty of spice and background oak, medium to full body, and a great finish. It's well worth seeking out.
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Tasting Panel
This sleek, steely white is tempered with Anjou pear, McIntosh apple, and lanolin. Echoes of mango and cashew settle on the palate, and minerality sets a most opulent tone on the finish.
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Wine Enthusiast
There's a great deal of restraint on the nose of this bottling, which shows crushed rocks, apple flesh and a hint of lime. The palate continues a similar track, as apple skins cut through the Asian pear core, with a firm tension throughout.
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Wine Spectator
Intense and vibrant, with generous green papaya, yellow apple, ripe salted melon and pear flavors at the core, revealing details of lemon verbena, candied ginger and white pepper on the sleek finish, where a hint of marzipan lingers.
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.
A lesser-known but elite AVA within the larger Santa Barbara district, the Santa Maria Valley AVA runs precisely west to east starting near the coast. The valley funnels cool, Pacific Ocean air to the vineyards more inland, allowing grapes a longer hang time to ripen evenly and achieve their full potential by harvest time. Combined with minimal rainfall, consistent warm sunshine, and well-drained soils, it is an ideal environment for grape growing.
Many of the wineries here are small and highly respected, having established a reputation in the 1970s and 80s for producing excellent Central Coast wines like Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. More recently, Syrah has also proven quite successful in the region. Many vineyards are owned by growers who sell their grapes to other wineries, so it is common to see the same vineyard name on bottlings from different wineries. Bien Nacido Vineyard is perhaps the best-known and most prestigious.