2022 Littorai Chardonnay Charles Heintz Vineyard

Pouring a slightly deeper yellow color, the 2022 Chardonnay Charles Heintz Vineyard offers darker notes of beeswax, yellow flowers, wet stones, and pineapples. It’s fuller bodied but has real structure and a savory feel on the finish. Drink over the next 10-12 years. It’s a 2022, but the phenolic structure comes through in this wine. The year 2025 marks the 30th anniversary for Littorai. Heidi and Ted Lemon operate Littorai from their Gold Ridge Estate in Sebastapol, where they produce Pinot Noir and Chardonnay from exceptional cool-climate vineyard sites on the Sonoma Coast and in Anderson Valley. Ted is, hands down, one of Sonoma's most important farmers and winemakers today. Though they farm biodynamically, they prefer to describe their practices in the vineyards as “generative farming,” a term intended to include the human relationship to the stewardship and shaping of the land as part of modern nature and integrated farming. In the winery, all the wines undergo spontaneous fermentations, with the reds going through two to three weeks of fermentation, and although Ted is not dogmatic in his approach, each of the wines is raised similarly. All of the wines for this report were tasted at the estate.