Does White Walnut produce fruit which tastes like Chardonnay?
Not like a Coconut-Lemon-Lime ICEE?
[Proper Chardonnay should reek of body odor and taste like badly rotten fruit.]
This from my Arterberry Maresh offering today:
2021 Tan Fruit White Walnut Chardonnay*
“White Walnut is a relatively new vineyard comprising eight acres planted around 2015 in the Dundee Hills. “The genetics that produced this is rare,” winemaker Jim Maresh explains, noting that the diverse clonal material in this vineyard includes 10 different heritage selections. The 2021 Chardonnay White Walnut Vineyard was fermented in oak and finished in stainless steel—the opposite of the Tank Fruit cuvée, which is also made from White Walnut fruit but fermented in stainless steel and finished in oak. Exoticism is the word I come back to again and again with this wine, which is extraordinarily expressive, singular and completely addicting. It offers very pure aromas of lemon meringue, candied peach, crème brûlée and candle smoke, with intense, honeyed undertones. The palate is satiny and sensuous, like a spatula smoothing the frosting on a cake. It has a concentrated, peachy core framed by streaks of flint, and its focused acidity drives all that exotic flavor into a hauntingly long finish. I’ve never tasted another Chardonnay quite like this!” 99 Erin Brooks WA.
Right.
But I’m wondering what it actually tastes like.
Will I recognize White Walnut fruit as being Chardonnay?
Or will it taste like a coconut-lemon-lime ICEE?
This is nuts. I bought a mixed case of these chards on the strong recommendation from the uk merchant back in nov last year. Prices just quadrupled! It’ll be interesting to see what release prices are like for the 22s.
This is the same merchant that is the main distributor for pycm, Xavier monnot, calsac, perseval etc in the uk. Given his preferences, I would be very surprised if he was recommending anything like you described.
Reviving this. Has anyone tried the White Walnut Estate wines? Project seems interesting but very little in the way of notes and info outside the website. The few notes on CT are quite positive
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On Friday [Aug 9], Arterberry Maresh emailed some Tan Fruit scores, from Stuart Pigott, which were very solid.
[Suckling is credited, but I assume it was Pigott who did the actual tastings.]
These were Pigott’s favorites amongst the Chardonnays [where his very favorite is at #1]:
#4, tied: 2022 Tan Fruit Dupee Vineyard Chardonnay
#4, tied: 2022 Tan Fruit Maresh Vineyard Chardonnay
#3: 2022 Tan Fruit Anela Vineyard Chardonnay
#2: 2022 Tan Fruit White Walnut Vineyard Chardonnay
#1: 2022 Maresh Vineyard Chardonnay
No real surprise that the old vines at the Maresh vineyard were his favorite.
Doubtful the wines smell like body odor and taste like rotten fruit. I didn’t see either of those descriptors in Erin Brooks review and am guessing Stuart Pigott also didn’t mention it either.
I would guess you would find a good amount of WV Chardonnay that you would enjoy, even if it didn’t quite get to the BO of your proper Chardonnay.
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Nathan, the White Walnut Estate is run by a winemaker named Chris Mazepink. He was formally head of several projects including the neighbor Archery Summit. His site is Southeast facing Dundee Hills, adjacent to Archery’s Renegade Ridge property.
The reviews on this thread are for Arterberry Maresh wines made from his site. But the brand “White Walnut” are Mazepink’s wines, and made by him onsite I believe. I’ve heard good reviews of the wines but have not had them to know how much coconut sense they have
Hope that helps
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I’ve only had one (the estate) and it was lovely. Definitely not overdone or filled with coconut or other stupid winemaking tricks. At ~$50 I thought it was a screaming value
Similar experience. I had the Estate Dundee Hills pinot noir about a month ago and thought it was excellent. Given the quality and price point, I ordered some of the estate and single vineyard chardonnay to try those out.
I haven’t had any of Chris Mazepink’s White Walnut wines but through the years almost everything I have had from him was excellent to fantastic. Including the 2005 Shea Wadensville bottling. One of the very best wines from Shea vineyard I have had. If it wasn’t for the talent and skills of Blair Trathan I would say it was the very best I’ve had. His Ebony Chardonnays were great, and I would absolutely take a flyer on his new wines based on what I have had previously.
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I’m looking at a typical Gen-X/Millennial sort of a tasting note, over at CT: “Citrus, lavender flower, nectarine, white peach, vanilla.”
All I can think is that High Fructose Corn Syrup must have been the Mother’s Milk of Gen-X and the Millennials.
At this rate, the Zoomers will soon be demanding bubblegum-flavored Chardonnay.
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