Moss Wood Chardonnay 2021
- 98
- $89
- Drink by: 2025-2035
Share
If one may begin with the bottom line up top, I think that this is the very best Moss Wood Chardonnay I have seen for a very long time. This sits with the finest the region can offer. Indeed, I’d go further. Moss Wood has an enviable record for its stunning Cabernet. If they maintain this standard with the Chardy, it won’t be long before it is on a par with the Cab. Perhaps the cooler vintage suited the style a little more. The future will reveal if that is so. The fruit was whole-bunch pressed, settled, seeded with a variety of yeasts for fermentation which sees the juice transferred to French oak barrels, half new, at the halfway mark. Maturation then continues for over a year.
Straw/yellow, it is immediately apparent that this is one of the more complex Chardonnays you’ll come across at the moment – wonderful stuff. The nose exhibits cashews, mandarins, white peaches, stonefruit, all through to a fabulous palate, immaculately balanced and with unrelenting intensity. There is oak, sure, but it has melded so well you hardly notice it. Supple, creamy, and a finish that just seems to linger forever with hints of lime marmalade. This is an absolutely brilliant and stunning Margaret River Chardonnay that should live for many years.
Ken was born and bred in Brisbane, Queensland. He had a non-trendy, perfectly happy childhood, in a family convinced alcohol meant instant condemnation to Hades. But a break fishing on the Great Barrier Reef, and some good wine, started a serious obsession that eventually took over. It did not stop Ken being chastised later for drinking Pol champagne, disgusted he’d drink anything made by a Cambodian dictator. Now, Ken mostly writes on wine, champagne and spirits for various newspapers, magazines and books, but is perhaps best known for his work in The Courier Mail. He also has a little sideline writing on cigars, fishing, travel and food. When not writing, fly-fishing for trout in NZ or bonefish on the flats of Cuba, travelling or smoking cigars, he is no doubt following a variety of sporting teams – the occasionally glorious Queensland Reds rugby, the dysfunctional Washington Redskins, the dodgy Arsenal and especially revels in the world restored to its proper axis with the return of the Ashes to their rightful home.
