Benovia Chardonnay La Pommeraie Russian River Valley 2023

We recently shared the 2023 Pinot counterpart to this Chardonnay from a famed single vineyard in the tiny Green Valley sub-AVA of the Russian River Valley, and y’all crushed it. The Chardonnay delivers the same level of goodness with a medley of orchard and exotic fruits, nutty elegance, and a fine spine of salty, cooling acidity. 95 points makes so much sense, but our 2-plus-bottle $30 price really does not!

Benovia came to be in 2005 led by wife-husband team Mary Dewane and Joe Anderson, and named respectively after their fathers, Ben and Novian. They purchased the historic Cohn Vineyard on Westside Road in 2003 and began by selling fruit to other producers before launching their own label two years later. In 2005 they also bought Hartman Road Vineyards in the Russian River Valley from Cecil DeLoach, expanding their small but mighty Pinot and Chardonnay-focused empire.

“La Pommeraie” is French for “the apple orchard,” a reference to the vineyard which was formerly an apple orchard belonging to Lee Martinelli Sr.’s uncle, Tony Bondi, and was later planted with grapes in 1990. Benovia has purchased fruit from Zio Tony Ranch since 2006, and the land sits along the Laguna Ridge at the edge of the Green Valley AVA receiving strong coastal influences: foggy mornings, salty sea breezes, cool evenings, and sunny days. The site is planted at high density to Dijon clones 548 and 95 – lending a strong Burgundian influence to this Sonoma-grown Chard.

With a focus on sustainable farming, Mike Sullivan was the winemaker for this bottling (he was the founding winemaker who actually stepped down in January of this year, passing the title on to former associate winemaker of 8 years, Adolfo Hernandez). Living up to the perfection of the 2023 vintage across northern California, this is a magnificent Chardonnay and well worthy of its $65 winery price.

It’s both vibrant and warm – with snappy acidity, a mouth-coating texture, and spices and fruits for days ending with a mineral-coated finish. A symphony of apple blossoms, crisp not-too-sweet apple, mango, and lemon zest appear energetically, followed by more sensuous notes of hazelnut, ripe pear, candied pineapple, a bit of ginger – supremely elegant and luscious with a mouthwatering finish. The cool-climate influence and magnificent balance is mesmerizing to no end, and we can’t really believe we can offer it for a mere $30 on 2 or more. Just think, if you got 1 bottle at full retail, it would be more than the cost of 2 here at First Bottle. I’m not a numbers person, but that’s just smart budgeting in the world of wine collecting. Go get yours!

FOOD PAIRINGS: Oh, you could go SO many delicious directions with this one. But I’m leaning into very simple – green chicken enchiladas, with a little bit of heat and a lot of brightness to really accentuate those same characteristics of this wine.