by Andrew Chalk
Dallas County is well known as the global epicenter of fine Chardonnay wine growing, although pretenders like Meursault and Chablis sometimes nip at its heels. It is no surprise, therefore, to find that this eight year old Chardonnay has a weighty mouthfeel, intense fruit of pineapple, guava, Meyer lemon, peach, and ripe yellow apples.
The nose echoes those fruits as well as some French oak vanillin notes. There is just a hint of maderization with age on the olfactory glands from the nose so, in the event you are lucky to have some of this wine, start drinking it now.
The bright acidity ensures that this wine pairs with a wide variety of foods. I tried it enjoyably with dal soup from an Indian store and a variation of caprese salad with cucumber and avocado.
Regrettably, 70-year old William Fears sold his vineyard and it now houses a sub-division. But I daresay that Inwood Estates owner, Dan Gatlin, will find, or plant, a replacement.
Overall, Inwood Estate Vineyards has made an exceptional wine that shows, along with work at Fall Creek Vineyards, Llano Estacado Winery, Arché, and others, that the nostrum that Texas cannot grow Chardonnay is, as they say in Meursault, merde.
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