Chardonnay, Ojai Vineyard, Block I

Bien Nacido often provides a racier style of Chardonnay with Ojai’s approach, but some years the wine skews a little richer. Take this 2021 bottling. It’s lively and moderate in alcohol, yet the gradual ripening in this cool vintage lent some riper character. It’s floral and minerally, but also shows some decadence with scents of brioche, light honey, streaks of marmalade and fresh pineapple. The crisp entry flows into rounder textures that give flavors of poached pear, spice and lemon curd, then it ebbs back into minerals and citrusy verve.

2021 was a terrific vintage for Santa Barbara County. While many other parts of the state were quite hot that year, this area remained anomalously cool and foggy. Fog is a major component of classic Santa Barbara County vintages, but it was more persistent than usual in 2021, and downright milky at times. This fruit was hand-harvested in the chill of the night with three picks in the middle of September. After pressing and overnight settling, they racked the juice into mostly neutral French oak barrels [15% new] and inoculated it with house-cultured native yeast [cultured from fruit picked during sampling]. They stirred it throughout primary and secondary fermentation, then left the wine to age on its lees for 11 months until bottling.

They’ve been working with the same section of Bien Nacido’s I-block, initially planted in 1973 with 12’ between rows, since 1991. In 1999, the proprietors planted rows between, making for 6’ between rows and essentially creating 2 vineyards, irrigated differently.

Jeb Dunnuck 94 pts