Church Road McDonald Series Hawke's Bay Chardonnay 2023

Description

Apricot, Lemon, Oak

"This is an unashamedly full style of chardonnay that knows what it's about. It's pale in the glass with aromas of lemons, roasted nuts, struck match and just a hint of salty sea water. The palate is richly textured and complex with concentrated fruit, well-handled oak and stunning minerality that makes it refreshing and delivers ultimate drinkability" Cuisine Magazine, Sep 2024

A medium bodied, supple Chardonnay balanced by a fine seam of fresh acidity with beautifully ripe stonefruit, fresh citrus and floral notes, overlaid with subtle complexities of gunflint, cashew nut, freshly baked bread. Already drinking exceptionally well, with careful cellaring we except this wine to continue to mature gracefully for 4 years or more from vintage date.

Sourced predominantly from the lower Tuki Tuki Valley, the soils here are calcareous clay loams, and in placed a clay pan, over alluvial gravels. This calcareous influence, a result of limestone erosion, lends a mineral edge to the wines while the dense clays and shallow pan, restrict vine vigour. This area is well exposed to the cooling afternoon sea breeze, which helps to retain fragance and fresh acidity in the fruit.

Vines were trained to two cane VSP. Though generally naturally low cropping, we will employ shoot and fruit thinning where required, along with declumping, close canopy trimming and approximately 70% removal of leaf through the fruit zone, to ensure a balanced, evenly spaced crop with dappled shade and good air flow.

Hand-harvested fruit was whole bunch pressed and filled to barrel with no settling or clarification. Wild primary and malolactic fermentation in French oak has delivered an extra degree of complexity and textural interest. A portion of machine harvested fruit was also used, with the juice being settled prior to racking to barrel. This component was allowed to start a wild fermentation but was finished with a selected commercial yeast strain. 25% new oak was used to further enhance the depth of the wine without dominating the fruit. The wine was matured on full yest lees in barrel approximately 8 months with only occasional yeast lees stirring. To avoid any unnecessary stripping effect, the wine was only coarsely filtered for clarity.