Winemaker Notes
This wine is true to the Tolpuddle Vineyard Chardonnay style: fine and precise with firm acidity, and a combination of lightness of texture and intensity of flavor. This refined cool climate Chardonnay suits many different plates, but we find it to be a perfect match with pan-fried sea scallops.
Professional Ratings
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Decanter
A relaxed nose belies the seductive roll and swirl of a full and voluptuous fruit profile, and a cooler vintage brings a cohesive yet concentrated voice to a tightly-wound meld of flavours. A savoury edge allows minerality to shine, while vibrant energy that tremulously ripples along a lengthy acid spine will maintain the verve in this vintage for a long time.
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James Suckling
I like the slate, flint and stone aromas to the sliced apples and white dried pineapple. Lemon curd. Some honeysuckle, too. Full-bodied, with creamy texture and extremely long finish. Complete and beautiful. So well crafted. Drink or hold. Screw cap.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2021 Chardonnay leads with pronounced reduction, alongside notes of leafy green herbs, pressed white flowers, struck match, fresh-picked curry leaf and white peach. 2021 was a La Niña year—cold and wet—the first in a trio of upcoming seasons (2021, 2022, 2023), and the acidity feels long and savory and woven throughout the fruit. The season was similar to 2017, and early indications could suggest that there may be similarities in 2026, as well. This is a beautiful wine of waxy persistence and freshness, with the phenolic (dry extract) line through the finish. 13% alcohol.
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Wine Enthusiast
In what has become an unmistakably Tolpuddle (and heavily Burgundy-influenced) style, this is a rich, intensively reductive Chardonnay that’s set for the long haul. For now, there’s a sulfuric potency, like a just-struck match combined with roasted cashews and buttered toast. Somewhere in the mix, a fruity note like pineapple rind or peach skin, emerges. The palate offers a similarly toast-driven effect, but it wears it well, adding textural weight, lifted acidity and depth of flavor to its inherent power.
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Wine Spectator
A stunning white, intense and complex, opening with vivid notes of roasted, salted hazelnut, then giving way to a sleek, crisp, intense core of lime, pomelo and tangerine flavors. Delivers details of toasted sesame seed, fresh-grated ginger, lemongrass and a touch of celery seed on the long, expressive 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.
Directly south of the city of Melbourne and the Mornington Peninsula wine region, the cool-climate island of Tasmania has earned an honorable reputation as the country’s finest producer of Sparkling Wine. Naturally the region also excels in top quality still wines from Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Riesling, all distinguished because of a high natural acidity. Most of the Tasmania vineyards cluster around the eastern side of the island from north to south.