Enfield Wine Co. - Chardonnay Citrine 2022

Price: $34.99

Sale Price: $29.98

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Producer	Enfield Wine Co.
Country	United States
Region	California
Varietal	Chardonnay
Vintage	2022
Sku	12016181
Size	750ml

 

CAC

95

Today’s offer is an outstanding California Chardonnay from a tiny family winery owned by John Enfield Lockwood and his wife Amy Seese. His wines are huge favorites of mine, with their focus on terroir and capturing the essence of the unique vineyard sites from which he sources his fruit.

But as much as I love his single vineyard wines, especially the Watson Ranch, my hands down, bang for the buck, go to wine for the money from Enfield is the brilliant and affordable Citrine Cuvee, named for a gemstone of yellow quartz. This wine always sells out almost on release, leaving us wishing we had more to sell. 

Whether it’s the power of suggestion or not, this wine always leads off with lovely notes of citrus, or “agrumes” as the French say, and the delicious 2022 offers gentle notes of orange blossom and lime that are accompanied by hints of yellow and white peach. All of these elements roll out on the palate as well, where it shows fantastic balance, minerality, and freshness - it’s no burly Cali butterball Chardonnay - but rather a focused, pristine expression more akin to a Bourgogne Blanc from a top producer, or even a village level Puligny-Montrachet. Not kidding!!

It’s a blend of some excellent vineyards with an average of 40 year old vines that can include Rorick Heritage, one of the only “Own-rooted” vineyards in California; Sierra Foothills, limestone & schist; Haynes, Napa Valley, alluvial gravel & volcanic ash; Heron Lake, Wild Horse Valley, quartz & mixed volcanic; and one of my favorite cool climate Chardonnay vineyards the amazing Watson Ranch, located in southernmost Napa Valley, with calcareous clay over limestone. It’s extremely coastal, right on the edge of San Pablo Bay, and the coolest of all Napa Valley Chardonnay. It sits on pure limestone right by the quarry that provided cement to rebuild San Francisco after the Earthquake.

Winemaking is pretty straight forward, with the grapes whole cluster pressed and lightly settled. The juice was fermented with native yeast in large 500L neutral oak puncheons and underwent full native malolactic fermentation. The wine was aged on lees for 11 months, picking up lovely texture and complexity, and was bottled unfined and unfiltered with nothing added but minimal effective SO2. It’s a cool 13.2 percent alcohol too, another attribute in my world.