2018 Aubert Russian River Valley Chardonnay

2018 Aubert Russian River Valley Chardonnay

Lisa Perrotti-Brown for Wine Advocate: "'2018 was a big sigh of relief this year compared to 2017!' Mark Aubert continued. '2018 was a substantially cooler vintage. One of the hallmarks of the 2018s was fantastic fermentations, incredible acidity and very successful malolactics.' More great news about 2018—yields are up about 20% this year for Aubert! This was mainly due to larger cluster weights—the counts were about normal. Those familiar with Aubert know that Mark does not practice extended barrel maturation. He had just finished racking the 2018 Chardonnays to tank when I visited in August 2019, prepping them to be bottled in December 2019. The 2018 Pinot Noirs were bottled in early July 2019." (10/2019) Mark Aubert built his reputation making Chardonnay and Pinot Noir for Peter Michael and Colgin before founding Aubert Wines in 2000. The Russian River bottling sits apart from the single-vineyard Chardonnays as an appellation-designated cuvee, using the same barrel-fermented cellar approach without naming a single site.