An American Chardonnay with a Difference - Crossbarn by Paul Hobbs

After stopping off in London for the Wine Fair, I thought I'd head west and pay a visit to California and review one of the wines from Paul Hobbs, who Forbes magazine describe as 'the Steve Jobs of wine' and was named as the most influential winemaker in California.

Paul is the second oldest of 11 children, he grew up on a working farm near Lake Ontario in western New York, where his father had him taste the same variety of apples grown in different orchards from all over, giving him the first hand experience of 'terrior'. In 1969 his father let him taste a 1962 Chateau d'Yquem which captured his imagination and inspired his interest in wine, from that evening he and his father decided to start planting vines on their apple farm and start learning about wine.

Paul moved west, and studied winemaking at the University of California, and where he did an internship at Robert Mondavi, who he would later go and work for, eventually becoming the winemaker of Opus One, probably America's most prestigious wine. In 1991 he decided to go it alone and setup the Paul Hobbs Winery in Sebastapol, then in 1999 he started Vina Cobos in Argentina, he also consults all over South America, in Cahors and even as far as Armenia.

His Crossbarn Chardonnay is produced from fruit carefully selected from selected vineyards from all over the Sonoma Coast appellation, where careful management of the yields is maintained to maximise the ripeness and concentration in the fruit. All the harvest is carried out by hand to ensure the fruit arrives at the winery in immaculate condition. 80 % of the harvest is fermented in Stainless Steel with the other 20% in old French oak, all the wine is then left to go through Malolactic Fermentation to soften the acidity and give it much more of a rounded mouth feel.

The wine has a wonderfully bright golden colour with a slight hint of green it, on the nose it had quite pronounced aromas of citrus, pear and honeysuckle. On the palate the fruit came through beautifully, with the pear becoming much more apple, a touch of white peach/nectarine and a delicate touch of lemon oil, it has a lovely rich mouthfeel that wasn't too intense and a well balanced soft acidity. Combine all these together and you really do get such a well crafted wine that takes a step away from the big heavily oakey Chardonnays that California produce so well. Would I recommend this wine, absolutely, but if I'm honest, it's hard to find a bad wine that Paul has had anything to do with.

A Legend Lives On

Earlier in the year I was invited to join in on a world wide toast to celebrate the birthday of the late, great Robert Mondavi, to help me celebrate I’d been sent a bottle of their 2006 Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon, lucky me.

One of the great American wine making pioneers, Robert Mondavi built his first winery in 1966, which was the first major winery in the Napa valley since prohibition had ended. He was a pioneer of putting the Varietal on the label, not naming them generically, he also turned the around the fortunes of the unpopular varietal, Sauvignon Blanc in the US by naming it Fume Blanc. Another one of his many accolades is that of creating one of America’s greatest wines, Opus One, a joint collaboration with Baron Phillipe de Rothschild which had begun as a chat, on Mondavi’s visit to his vineyards in Bordeaux during 1978.

Although it says it’s a Cabernet Sauvignon on the label, it is actually a blend consisting of 95% Cabernet Sauvignon and 5% Cabernet Franc, according to the tasting notes, the website says it is a much more eclectic mix of varietals. The wine is fermented in a combination of oak and stainless steel tanks, spending a maturation period of 14 months in oak, of which 20% are new oak.

In the glass you got an opaque inky purple colour, with very pronounced aromas of dark fruits, blackcurrant, plums and cherries with a tiny bit of sweet spice coming through from the background. On the palate you got all the aromas coming through in waves at you, combine this with a good amount of acidity and masses of fine silky tannins, and you got a pretty amazing wine, but that’s what you’d expect when you pay these sorts of prices.

This is a full bodied wine, that at this young stage drinks nicely now but can age for a good few years yet, but really, to get the best from it now, you should really drink it with food. This is a wine that’s definitely worth giving a go if you’re looking to spend a bit a more on nice bottle, but remember it will benefit greatly by being opened a good couple of hours before drinking, and if possible even decanting.