2010 Diatom Chardonnay Hana Shinobu

The 2010 Chardonnay Hana Shinobu is an implosive wine packed with bright fruit and citrus, punctuated by bracing notes of minerality. It comes across as a bit simple but some of that may be attributable to the recent bottling.

The 2010 Chardonnay Hana Shinobu is an implosive wine packed with bright fruit and citrus, punctuated by bracing notes of minerality. It comes across as a bit compact and one-dimensional, but some of that may be attributable to its recent bottling. Anticipated maturity: 2012-2016. These 2010s from Greg Brewer encapsulate a desire to move even further along a trajectory of simplicity and minimalism inspired by Japanese culture. Greg Brewer has removed the vineyard designations from his wines and replaced them with Kanji characters that he feels capture the essence of each site. Kanji is a traditional Japanese language based on Chinese characters. Brewer describes the 2010 vintage as relatively cool but with heat spikes towards the end of the season. He harvested early to preserve as much freshness as possible and also bottled on the early side. The wines were all fermented and aged in steel, in very reductive environments, with blocked malos and no batonnage. Not surprisingly, most of the 2010s were a bit reduced when I tasted them in June, but the wines showed quite well with several hours of air. These are striking whites for their transparency and purity, even if at times they are north of 16% in alcohol. Tel. (805) 452-5609; Fax (805) 735-9185; www.diatomwines.com