#91 of Top 100, 2024. The 2023 Chardonnay (Santa Barbara County) is a total stunner. Bright, aromatic and vibrant, the 2023 is lights-out, brilliantly marrying fruit intensity and energy. Apricot, mint and white flowers abound. This is a stunning wine for the price and for its production of around 40,000 cases. All of this fruit is from Mission Hills in Los Alamos.
Made by Greg Brewer and already bottled, the 2023 Chardonnay comes from the Mission Hills Vineyard just outside of Los Alamos. Its vivid medium gold hue is followed by a vibrant nose of salted citrus, tangerine, exotic flowers, and subtle spice. Medium-bodied, pure, rounded, and beautifully balanced, it has plenty of power and density, integrated acidity, and a great finish. This impeccably made Chardonnay should be snatched up by readers, as it competes with wines at two to three times the price.
This stunning wine leaps out of the glass, with concentrated flavors and aromas of white peach, quince and pineapple, plus floral accents of orange blossoms and lemon curd. Finishes with mouthwatering acidity, a note of crunchy sea salt minerality and a whiff of lemon verbena. Drink now.
An unoaked chardonnay that's full-bodied but balanced and amazingly rich in ripe fruit. Flavors of lemons, green apples, pineapple. mangoes, minerals and chalk. Harvested late in the year, fermented in steel tanks, then bottled and sold early while it's fresh and racy in texture. Despite not aging in barrels, it offers good butter and spices considering how crisp and tangy it is. Drink now.
One of the region's perennial top-value Chardonnays that retains the truest sense of place. With the aroma of salty sea air and dried white flowers, winemaker Greg Brewer calls the wine ‘big and neutral, blurring the lines of expectation.’ Spicy lime flavours combined with cardamom, tingly acidity, and a dash of white pepper finish it off.
This wine made by the legendary Greg Brewer offers a very affordable taste of his mastery. Extremely floral aromas of jasmine meet with tangerine sorbet, mint and green apple on the nose. The palate is awash in honeysuckle, poached pear and green peppercorn flavors.
Winery Notes
Aromas of lemon, citrus blossom and wet stone, alongside flavors of saline and white peach that round out this precise, balanced white wine.