Winemaker Notes
The Sandhi Central Coast Chardonnay is the beating heart of their efforts in California. This is a wine crafted to show that even at an accessible price, when Chardonnay is sourced wisely and crafted with integrity, anything is possible. The vineyard sources are planted to older vines across a broad array of microclimates and soils. This brings character and depth to the 2020 Central Coast Chardonnay. Sandhi also partners with growers who don’t use herbicides or chemical fertilizers. This is not just a philosophical choice, it also yields wines with more energy and complexity.
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2020 Chardonnay Central Coast features golden apple fruits with touches of dark spice, dried chamomile, crushed almonds and beeswax. The palate is satiny and fresh with slowly expanding nutty flavors, and it finishes long and spicy.
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.
The largest and perhaps most varied of California’s wine-growing regions, the Central Coast produces a good majority of the state's wine. This vast California wine district stretches from San Francisco all the way to Santa Barbara along the coast, and reaches inland nearly all the way to the Central Valley.
Encompassing an extremely diverse array of climates, soil types and wine styles, it contains many smaller sub-AVAs, including San Francisco Bay, Monterey, the Santa Cruz Mountains, Paso Robles, Edna Valley, Santa Ynez Valley and Santa Maria Valley.
While the Central Coast California wine region could probably support almost any major grape varietiy, it is famous for a few Central Coast reds and whites. Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon and Zinfandel are among the major ones. The Central Coast is home to many of the state's small, artisanal wineries crafting unique, high-quality wines, as well as larger producers also making exceptional wines.