Beau Rivage Chenin Blanc 2020

This increasingly impressive Chenin Blanc is drawn from some of Clarksburg’s oldest vines, planted in the 1960s and sourced from a long-term organic grower. The grapes are picked in two lots: those from the sunny side of the vine were crushed to release extract, while fruit from the shadier side was pressed as whole clusters using a very long, firm cycle. The musts are fermented with indigenous yeasts and were raised in eight-year-old, low-toast Burgundy barrels. Kelley uses more and more solids each year, with the wines building texture and drive from their time on lees.

This year, the fruit was picked at about the same ripeness as in 2019, but the winemakers modified how they pressed the grapes to capture brighter acidity. Simply put, the less you break the ‘cake’ of solids during pressing, the lower the pH of the resulting must. This modification means Kelley can pick several weeks later than in previous years while achieving lower pHs—and thus greater freshness—in the finished wine. Expect a tension-filled and chalky white marrying the engaging texture of well-ripened Chenin Blanc with lovely clarity, fine-boned texture and impressive length. It doesn’t seem too early to call this out as a new Californian benchmark.