The wine has a minerality that is both compelling and atypical for California, and, a gorgeous texture. There are notes of just ripe pear and citrus along with an intriguing almond wood note. That said, the defining characteristics of the Platt Chardonnay are the acidity, the minerality and the tension in the wine. Harvested at 3.02 pH and with a finished pH (post malo) of 3.12 this wine sings in the glass.
This wine will age, like a great white Burgundy, for a decade or more. I frequently open this wine and drink one glass a day for a week to see the evolution in it as it is exposed to air. I refrigerate it, but I don’t gas it. The wine evolves beautifully and shows almost no signs at all of oxidation, even after a week of being open. This is a masterful effort from what I believe is the greatest site for Chardonnay in California.
Vineyard Notes
The 2015 Vintage started with a cool spring that limited crop yields severely. . .especially in the Sonoma Coast. The lower crop yields produced an intense vintage with riper fruit profiles. Platt 2015 yields were 42 tons for the 31.3 acres of vines or about 1.3 tons per acre.
Platt sits 2.5-miles from the Coast and the vineyards cascade down a south-facing ridgeline. The Goldridge fine sandy loam soils are the most sought after for Pinot Noir and afford excellent drainage. The consistent west wind provides good airflow which helps keep the grapes clean. The Chardonnay blocks sit at the higher elevations between 625 and 850 feet above sea level and are frequently (but not always) above the fog that fills the valley most every morning.
The Platt Chardonnay is a wine that rivals the top Grand Cru’s of Burgundy. We aged the wine in Francois Freres and Boutes barrels for 14 months with only 20% new. The Platt site, like Grand Cru Chablis sites, is not a request for a heavy new oak presence. I believe in letting each site express itself and that means that each of our wines has a unique barrel program and wine chemistry that reflect that particular site in a given vintage.