Less oaky than the 2014 but showing sexy clove and cinnamon notes to go with the brighter lemon curd. Wonderfully fine-grained and glyceral yet light on its feet, offering adamantly dry, penetrating, youthfully tight flavors of lemon, orange zest, dried herbs, brown spices and salty minerality. Brisk, lemony and long on the aftertaste. This wine is extremely dry at 0.41 grams per liter residual sugar, but Ramey notes that all of these vintages finished below one gram. Splendid California Chardonnay with the structure for a graceful evolution in bottle.

Smooth and juicy with purity, silky texture and a core of bright acidity; a happy marriage of one of California’s greatest winemakers with one of the state’s most iconic vineyards; a stunning effort.

The Hyde Vineyard Chardonnay might be the most compelling of all David Ramey’s single vineyard wines in this vintage. The selection at Hyde are Wente, Robert Young and Long field, planted to heavy Haire Clay Loam about 30 inches deep with impenetrable clay subsoil, which limits vine vigor and crop yield. 2013 was an ideal growing season, with clear sunny days and cool evenings leading to a long, moderate growing season and the results are displayed in this stunning Chardonnay. This is impressive for its absolutely gorgeous depth and precision as it opens with expressive aromas of Asian pear, honeysuckle, lemon zest, smoke, flinty minerals, dried herbs all bursting from the glass. On the palate this is fresh and inviting demonstrating fantastic balance, with a layer of underlying acidity and a wonderful range of flavors which are beautifully focused. The 2013 Hyde Vineyard Chardonnay is a complete wine which will continue to drink well over the course of the next decade. (Best 2016-2026)

This pale yellow colored Chardonnay from Ramey was well received by the panel. It opens with an attractive pear bouquet with hints of lemon, toasted marshmallow and vanilla oak. On the palate, this wine is medium bodied, slightly acidic and fresh. The flavor profile is a mild vanilla oak influenced Granny Smith apple with notes of lemon. We also detected hints of lychee and butterscotch as well. The finish is dry and refreshing. The panel suggested pairing this very nice Chard with broiled scallops finished with an orange butter cream sauce. Enjoy - KWGTP

All of the Ramey single-site Chardonnays show fairly close kinship with respect to their ripe yet zesty, very solidly structured builds, and, of a very good lot, this one from the Hyde Vineyard is the deepest and nmost explicit of them all.  It is deep and continuous with a controlled sense of potency and great concentration, and if still fairly tight, its richness and depth are impossible to miss.  Like its mates, it is a wine that warrants waiting, and, however, impressive it may be at the moment, it is guaranteed to grow ever more so with age.