Analysis:
Alcohol:13.5 % | PH: 3.49 | Titratable acidity: 6.53 g/L
Bottling Date: September 2018
Cellaring: 3+ years
Tasting Notes:
A fruit driven Chardonnay full of ripe peach, mango, banana, papaya and lemon sherbet fruit with layers of nut, popcorn, caramel and vanillin oak. Full bodied and rich on the palate with crisp acidity and flavours of exotic tropical fruit, white peach, poached pear and fresh notes of lemon zest and grapefruit mixing with the toasty oak, shortbread and custard. Try this with a mild butter chicken or Dungeness Crab drenched in butter.
Rhys Pender, Master of Wine
Wine Making:
The 2017 growing season got off to a cool, slow start but the vines quickly caught up for lost time in the summer months. The warm temperatures through August and September combined with the cool nights of late summer and early fall produced bold fruit flavors and crisp acidity.
The estate grown Chardonnay grapes were handpicked the first week of October 2017. They were hand sorted and then dropped whole-cluster into our pneumatic press for a gentle extraction of the juice. Gravity fed into tank, the juice was chilled overnight to remove excess solids. 15% of the juice was fermented and aged in stainless steel tank to add crispness, freshness, floral and mineral notes to our final product. The rest of the juice was fermented in oak barrels. Each method has advantages: fermentation under temperature controlled tanks produces vibrant and lean wines while barrel fermentation brings out savoury and subtle oaky undertones that rounds out texture due to lees stirring.
Ageing: 84% French, 12% American, 4% Russian with 63% new oak, 30% one-year old
