Poco a Poco Mendocino County Chardonnay 2021
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Gentle handling of the wine, using gravity flow, and minimizing the use of machines in production helps to preserve the vitality of the wine. The amount of new oak is limited to less than 40 percent. The wine is bottled unfined and unfiltered.
Growing grapes and making wine is poco a poco, little by little. When a block of vines takes an extra few years to grow up the stake, it’s poco a poco. When each cluster of grapes is sorted by hand, it’s poco a poco. When the wine in barrel takes a month or two longer to finish fermentation, it’s poco a poco. We live in a time when most things can be made, ordered, and consumed in a matter of days. The beauty of winegrowing is that we must live poco a poco.
One of the most popular and versatile white wine grapes, Chardonnay offers a wide range of flavors and styles depending on where it is grown and how it is made. While it tends to flourish in most environments, Chardonnay from its Burgundian homeland produces some of the most remarkable and longest lived examples. California produces both oaky, buttery styles and leaner, European-inspired wines. Somm Secret—The Burgundian subregion of Chablis, while typically using older oak barrels, produces a bright style similar to the unoaked style. Anyone who doesn't like oaky Chardonnay would likely enjoy Chablis.
A large and diverse appellation within California’s North Coast AVA, Mendocino is home to several smaller sub-regions—most notably the Anderson Valley. This scenic region, with rolling hills covered in redwood forests as well as vineyards, is one of the world’s top producers of certified organically-grown grapes. Due to wide geographical and climatic variation, a vast array of wine styles can be found here.