2021 Chardonnay, R. Dinner - Sonoma Coast
This is a gorgeous wine, I just wish there was more of it. It is exceptionally concentrated and mouthfilling, but also beautifully delineated and lifted. A vivid core of lemon curd, fuji apple and apricot gains depth on the palate with the emergence of vanilla, hazelnut and pot de crème notes that linger on the incredibly long and lively finish.
Vineyard: The stars aligned in 2021 gifting us with our first harvest from one of Chardonnay’s most storied vineyards, during one of the best vintages of recent memory. Fans of Paul Hobbs Chardonnay will know Richard Dinner Vineyard well, as the winery has produced a bottling from this revered site for more than thirty years. And now, we join the short list of boutique wineries fortunate to make a wine from this exceptional Chardonnay terroir. Tucked along the cool western flank of Sonoma Mountain and rooted in a complex mix of clay, loam, gravel and volcanic tuff, Richard Dinner Vineyard’s mix of fog cooled mornings and evening, long warm days and our favorite Old Wente clone produces stellar fruit… made even more remarkable by the near perfect 2021 vintage
Winemaking: In an effort to express the individual nature of each site, we employ similar winemaking with all our Chardonnays. In keeping with that, our 2021 Richard Dinner Vineyard Chardonnay was picked under lights in the very early morning and whole fruit pressed. After settling for three days, the juice was racked to 50% new French oak barrels and inoculated with a low rate of Burgundian yeast. The wine was cold barrel fermented at 58-68°F for over 100 days before aging for an additional 14 months. undergoing a true secondary malolactic fermentation in the spring. The wine was bottled unfiltered and unfined.
Tech Info:
Suggested Retail: $75/bottle Aging: 17mos, 50% new French oak
Case Production: 52 cases Bottled: March 9, 2023
Harvest Date: September 8, 2021 Alc: 14.4
Clone: Mt. Eden, Rued/Sees TA: 6.5
Brix at harvest: 23.9 pH: 3.33