April 2002 Over the last twelve months, Wine & Spirits tasted 557 Chardonnay. The following wines received the strongest praise from our critics. A list of all chardonnay tasted, with the recommended wines highlighted, is included with subscription copies.

Chardonnays
94 I Grgich Hills $33 1999 Napa Valley Chardonnay A classic vintage from Grgich, this wine melts in the mouth, then sets the mouth watering for grilled prawns, for skate in brown butter, for parmigiano Reggiano. It's more Pacific coast in its crispness than you might expect from Napa, the fruit fresh as pear, perfumed as white peach, lifted and bright. Oak in fermentation and aging provides the integration of the flavors, the crŹme bržlŽe edge, while the strength of the fruit rises out of that caramelization with a jasmine spice. Made without a malolactic fermentation to soften it, this wine needs a bit more time to develop in the bottle. Grgich Hills Cellar, Rutherford, CA
94 I Kistler $80 1999 Russian River Valley Dutton Ranch Chardonnay Kistler has been working with Dutton Ranch chardonnay since 1979, from the same parcel on a hillside of gold ridge soil above the ranch offices. This twentieth vintage, a luscious, golden '99, has dramatic complexity. It's not shy about its alcohol, but it's neither warm nor loose, using all its power as a catalyst for flavor, remaining tight in the mouth, expanding into scents of floral apple, clarified butter, nectarine, all so smooth that it's not immediately obvious how sexy, almost lascivious this is underneath. Anyone lucky enough to cellar a cache of bottles should witness a fascinating development ahead. Kistler Vineyards, Sebastopol, CA
94 I Neyers $38 2000 Carneros District El Novillero Vineyard Chardonnay Some wines manage to capture the place in the grape and let it explode out of the glass. Here it is, so fresh and clean that the scent and taste may transport you to a hillside in Carneros, feeling the breeze off the San Pablo Bay. You may sense the mineral scent of seashells, the flavors of stone fruit, of lime and white raspberry. Everything is bright about this except the color of the wine itself, which is slightly cloudy - it was fermented with native yeast, then bottled unfined and unfiltered. The texture is as firm as they come, the flavors lasting - and the wine itself should last for years. Neyers Vineyards, St. Helena, CA
94 I Neyers $30 2000 Napa Valley Chardonnay There is no breeze off the Pacific in the Napa Valley, but this wine may lead you to imagine one. It's big and magnificent, on the scale of a Corton-Charlemagne with that vast feel of a field of wheat in the sun and the wind that often accompanies the best young wines of that appellation, here more immediately mineral, with that Pacific spray of salt. The fruit is fragrant as peaches ripening on the tree, cool as tree-ripened pears as well. And the flavors last for minutes, their power insistent and continuing on and on. It's a blend from three vineyards in southern Napa, including 10 percent from Stony Hill, and showing the great wine growing at each. Neyers Vineyards, St. Helena, CA
94 I Patz & Hall $36 1999 Russian River Valley Dutton Ranch Chardonnay Scents of apple blossoms lift the aroma and last long after each taste: This wine is transparent, a green plate of glass through which to view the Russian River. The youthful greenness makes it crisp, clean and clear, the fruit ripe as peach, tart as lemon, the texture fat and creamy yet buoyant, its fleshiness pricked by a pine needle acidity. Incipient mineral aspects boost the texture and only begin to hint at the complexity that will evolve as this wine takes on age. All the impacted flavor holds to a balance and suggests optimal drinking at six to eight years from the vintage. Patz & Hall Wine Co., Rutherford, CA
93 I Flowers $36 1999 Sonoma Coast Chardonnay The Flowers team struck gold with their '99 chardonnay, a wine that resonates with the clear, healthy ripeness of grapes grown in the right place, in the right season: of grapes grown well. This young wine is dense with a complex potential energy, all bound up with mango, lime and lemon, with honey and beeswax, with wheat and oyster shell leesiness. It's delicate and fleshy at once, oak lending a toastiness like the sun warming that fruit to its beautiful ripeness. Many of Flowers vines were planted in '91 and '92, just beginning to reach maturity in this vintage, and showing the sort of Sonoma Coast restraint that allows their chardonnays to soar. Flowers Vineyard & Winery, Cazadero, CA
93 I Fritz $21.99 2000 Russian River Valley Dutton Ranch Chardonnay The good news it that of the three Fritz Chardonnays we tasted, we preferred the least expensive. And it's delicious, a powerful, saturated wine that doesn't go alcoholic. Instead, it provides a mouth-coating flavor of white chocolate, Indian spices, tangerine all well delineated, built into a richness that holds as clean as a fine Puligny. For now, its pale and undeveloped, but give it time and it should be pure seduction. Fritz Winery, Cloverdale, CA
93 I Frog's Leap $22 2000 Napa Valley Chardonnay Big and leesy at first, the more time you spend with this wine the more it comes across breezy and refined. The flavors are all about minerals, salty, crisply defined. Then they finish on fruit, on quince and citrus flavors that are finely drawn. It's got good grip for scallops broiled in butter, and its got staying power to age. Frog's Leap, Rutherford, CA
93 I Kendall-Jackson $27 1999 Sonoma Coast Great Estates Chardonnay Put aside any preconceptions you may have about the Kendall-Jackson style, the wine that struck gold with a touch of residual sweetness, and taste this new release made by Randy Ullom. You'll recognize the Jackson touch in the wine's size and ripeness: It's big and full, with sweet peach scents. But it doesn't finish sweet, and it goes far beyond anything you might have tasted before from this producer: This is a complex, winey chardonnay, built on a robust layering of flavors that last in a gentle, unhurried way. In fact, you could sip and study it over the course of hours, trying to unravel the layers of smoked meat, apple mash and applewood smoke, pear and dry peach. Adea Wine Company, Carlton, OR
93 I Signorello $38 1999 Napa Valley Chardonnay So ripe, this bristles with flavor intensity, with a color deep as gold, with a power that parallels a Port, if Port could be made from chardonnay. But it's dry, focused on the meatier side of its fruit, on figs and peach, pumped up with chamomile - often a delicate flavor accent to finely grown chardonnay - here presented as chamomile on steroids. The wine raises any number of questions: What could you serve it with now? (Nothing less robust than a roast suckling pig.) What will happen when it ages? (Though huge, it's neither overwrought or overripe, and well may go the distance.) Where can I get some? Signorello Vineyards, Napa, CA
93 I Sebastopol $34 1999 Russian River Valley Dutton Estate Winery Vineyard Chardonnay Joe and Tracy Dutton (with Merry Edwards consulting) make this pale gold chardonnay with fruit from the Dutton family's well known vineyard, and the result is a perfumed wine elevated by its time in oak, but not at all oaky. It starts off with a floral spice, exotic scents of tea and lilies that lead right into the dry lime and juicy pineapple fruit, substantial but not sweet. The finish melds two sides of lime: the mineral character of the stone along with the citrus fruit. Sebastopol Vineyards, Sebastopol, CA