Enchanteuse is French, means enchanting and is the name of my first real estate wine from Ron Sanchez's own winery Domaine Verdant … 2015 Enchanteuse Chardonnay.
The grapes come from the house Chardonnay vines of the two clones 76 and 96 and are from the slightly warm growing season in 2015, which gave the vines extra energy that made it possible to produce grapes with good taste and intensity.
The vines were planted back in 1998 and 1999 … the wine is made with whole bunches in open steel fermentation vats over 4-6 weeks at 10-13 degrees and using a yeast strain from Champagne known for reliable fermentation at low temperatures.
It is also known for being clean and neutral, whereby you do not lose the imprint of the terroir, but after fermentation the wine is then aged for a full 15 months in its French, new French barriques. Only a modest 50 cases of this wine have been made.
Aroma-wise, it is not a broad and barrel-heavy Chardonnay from the start, but certainly nicely mature with slightly weak oxidative, honey-like notes and a fruit of pear mash, tinned pears, apricot, melon, almonds, linden wood, beeswax... and slowly the barrel notes appear with licorice candy and vanilla .
The taste is really soft and ripe... it's baked apples, applesauce, dried apricots, melon, lemon and pickled lemons. It gives a slightly dark and intense bite with an elegant, robust and quite deep acidity that is wrapped in gentle and creamy well-being. It is thus no fat and bloated Chardonnay, but muscular, dense, deep and yet ripe Burgundian with juice and power, which just needs time and air to stretch its wings. 93 points.
