2006 Santa Barbara Winery Chardonnay Reserve Lafond/Melville/Sweeney Canyon

Community Tasting Notes (6)

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  5/26/2011 - timewithwine wrote:

  So very glad this is gone. So much acetone! With purchased stuffed chicken breasts.

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  1/6/2011 - timewithwine wrote:

  Quite a bit of color for a Viognier at this point. Some slight oxidation has occurred in this bottle. Distinct flavors of apricot, fig, tropical fruits, sweet orange blossom all followed up and finished off by toast. Unfortunately, the other distinct aspects are acetone and heat in the bouquet and palate. 16.3% alc. With shrimp in butternut squash and roasted red pepper sauce; a very nice pairing. Not Recommended.

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  12/9/2010 - timewithwine wrote:

  A year and a half has passed since tasting this wine. With that passing, I had hoped the alcohol might settle down, but that is not the case with this wine. However, the fruit is still lively and fresh with apricot, peach, pear, orange blossom, smoke and some vanilla. The intensity of the white flower makes for a sweetness that borders on too much, but is pulled back from the edge by some cantaloupe. But the problem with the wine is its finish the excessive heat from the alcohol mars the wine something awful, making it almost laborious to drink. As a wine to look at in the glass, it is beautiful. As a wine to explore by smell, it is heady. But as a wine to savor and enjoy its mouthfeel, no. 16.3% alc. With pork loin topped with bacon and a maple glaze. Recommended with Reservations, leaning to Not Recommended.

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  5/25/2009 - timewithwine wrote:

  The odd, inconsistent saga of this wine continues. While I enjoyed it at the winery, my first bottle in Va was almost undrinkable. However, in November of last year the wine was good and the heat from the 16.3% alcohol - one of many things that marred the earlier bottle - did not show. A recipe calling for white wine might be just the thing for sacrificing yet another bottle of this wine. Beautiful in the glass with clean yellow core. The “apricot, pear and ... vanilla cream” from the last bottle are all here as well. The intense white flower and orange blossom of the wine makes it seem almost sweet only to be reined in by a bit of lemon-lime and cantaloupe. But the tinge on the finish isn’t spice, but heat from the alcohol. It seems to build making the wine difficult to finish. Without food, which contributes to the wine not showing well; for that reason I’ll not post this TN. Recommended with Reservations, leaning to Not Recommended due to variation.

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  11/15/2008 - timewithwine wrote:

  The last bottle I tried of this wine two months ago was off putting. But for my prior experience with the same wine, I would have been rated it as “Not Recommended”. It had unpleasant sulphur note. The time had come to pull another bottle and see if it was bottle variation or some other issue.
  
  Its pale yellow core gives way to a thin green tinge on the rim. Apricot, pear and a faint vanilla cream scent carry the nose. The apricot is almost heady. The nose was sound. However, something odd and off-putting made an early appearance on the palate that fortunately blew off. What developed was a round and full palate that tracked the nose. Th addition of lemon-lime sneaked in on the mid-palate. The finish fades to cantaloupe. A pleasant enough Viognier, but not an exciting one. That is packs 16.3% alc. is somewhat amazing. It does not show. With buttermilk, tabasco and cornmeal fried shrimp and peanut soup. Recommended with reservations only because of the initial oddity on the palate.

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