Ah, Giaconda Chardonnay: the one that goes to eleven.
Full golden colour. Lots of struck match, bacon, and spicy oak, wheat germ, aniseed, tangerine and peel. Brassy golden fruit – sort of red apple, peach and mixed citrus. And SO intense, it’s almost painful to drink (at least as at now). Acidity is very firm running hard through a gently viscous glossiness. Flinty texture and chalky grip is on offer too. Long spicy finish of browned butter and toasted lime. It does not lack complexity, and it does not lack power, though there’s arguably too much of everything to make it pleasant drinking now. A few more years in bottle should see it purring.
95+ Points
Gary Walsh, The Wine Front