 Hello hello welcome back to exotic wine travel. I am your host Matthew Horky. Hi I'm Shereen Ty. Welcome back to the show today. We have a show that Shereen had to get really special and dressed up. It looks so good because she's excited about this show. We're talking about value driven Chardonnay from Santa Barbara County. Are you excited? Yeah very much. I like the Chardonnay from Santa Barbara County a lot. A lot fantastic. So before we get started guys I want to let you know that this video has not been paid for in any way shape or form but if you do like these videos, if they do add value to your life, check out our downloadable guide to the wines of Santa Barbara. Sipping Santa Barbara. Recommended wines and producers. I'm Kendall PDF and EPUB. I will put it up on the screen. Before we get in the show awesome we get we just Corvind these wines into using our Corvind Model 2 Elite. Thank you to Corvind for allowing us for giving us a test sample to use and we poured them into these a beautiful Gabrielle Glass Gold Edition handle of glasses. Universal glasses. Do you like these things? Lovely. I mean it's so convenient you can it every single one of these. They've covered everything in it. I'll put a discount code for those glasses in towards the end of the video. We are not affiliates. We don't get anything from that. I want to say one thing about this Corvind. We've filmed now 13 or 14 episodes went through 40 bottles of wine and the first capsule just ran out. So I was really amazed to see how long the Corvind act. The capsule actually lasted. Let's get into some of the wines. So Chardonnay. I think that probably Chardonnay is the best grape in Santa Barbara County in terms of performance. It's hard to say. I can't I can't say that seriously because the Pinot Noir the Cera are tasty. Well it's so cool because the expressions are different in Santa Rita Hills versus Santa Maria Valley. That's where we have these three wines. These are value driven Chardonnays under $30. I think we have 22, 22 and 30 and I think I've seen these for even less retail. Shall we get started? Very much. Legendary producer. First we have Obon Clermont his Santa Barbara County Appalachian level Chardonnay from 2006. So this is a very value driven Chardonnay. Jim Clendon and Obon Clermont. Legendary. Legendary producer really strives to make more Burgundian style Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. Let's give this a little bit of a go. This is barrel fermented, right? Yeah. If I remember correctly it may not be this specific bottle but Obon Clermont Chardonnay was the first Chardonnay from Santa Barbara that I liked. Yeah okay let's give this a go. Not intense but I get the Chardonnayness, the lemon, kind of the banana peel. I do get the topstiness from the oil but it's very well integrated. Really beautiful. Just kind of a light, unfussy Chardonnay, right? Like really proper melon, lemon. Let's see what the color is. It looks like it's pretty dark. The lumen has a little bit more color. Well let's give this a go. Good start to the show. It's a bit toasty on the bouquet but I don't get the toastiness in the mouth. To me it's a lot of sweet fruit in the mouth. It's lemon and ripe flavors, right? It's not like the most overly complex but this is his entry level wine. I think this is very good crystalline fruit flavors, medium whey. It's not oak, it's not oak-y, it's not buttery. It's just delicious, right? Yeah it's quite creamy in the mouth but it's not heavy. Big apple, nice round aroma. It's a little bit spicy on the palate. I'm 4.0 on this. I think you're a fan of this. I'm complicated but very lovely. I imagine a lot of people would like it. Super well made, delicious. I think you can find this for under $20 to really get a feel for what Santa Barbara County Chardonnay is all about. Yeah, let's move on. Good job. Good job by Jim. Let's move on him. We have the J Wilkes Santa Maria Valley Chardonnay from 2015. Interesting fact, J Wilkes owned by the Miller family which owns a lot of the famous biennial cedar vineyards. Wes Hagen is the producer. He used to work at Clos Pepe. He's very well renowned. I'm excited about tasting this after the strong showing by the J Wilkes Pinot Blanc I had yesterday I thought was fantastic. This rolls in at $22. What do you think about Santa Maria fruit versus Santa Maria hills? Generally, I tend to find that Santa Maria is fruitier and more floral whereas Santa Rita tends to be more linear and flinty. That's a generalization because I think there's a lot of vineyard to vineyard difference as well but yeah that's how I find in general. There's a big difference right away between the J Wilkes and the Au Bon Clamotte. This is much more like lemon custard and more stone fruit and creamier for me so to speak. I think I pick up a little bit more wood. The aroma is more high-pitched. It's darker in color. That's a little bit of green uplift to it too. For me this is like has brighter pineapple lemony stuff going on. This is more creamy on the nose to me. I find the fruit flavor more precise in J Wilkes. You like this. You like this quite a bit right? This is a quite highly scored one. Let me give this up for an entry level one. Let me give this a go. For a floral and honey. What? You like that or? It almost tastes like this vineyard with something inside. It is floral honey. This shows a little bit more wood than this. This has less wood to me. This shows a little bit more. I'm pretty impressed. I've been pretty hard on J Wilkes wines in the past. This is the two that I've had pretty nice. Do you like this? Yeah, very much. It steps it up a level in complexity of this one. I think I would put about 4.1 out of 5, 4.0 on the vino. Again, scores don't matter that much but that's just my personal reference. I think this is pretty solid. I'm really intrigued by the floral and honey-ness. I'm just really wondering if there's any other food in them. Very nice. It's beautiful. They don't have any. They do have Pinot Blanc though. Let's move on here. This is a wine I am excited about trying. This is the Lumen Chardonnay from 2015, the Sierra Madre Vineyards in Santa Maria Valley. This is made by Lane Tanner. Legendary producer. She's one of the first female independent winemakers in Santa Barbara County. This is a new project. I like the Grenache. I'm excited to try this. Let's get it going. Very reasonable price. It's a single vineyard Chardonnay, 30 US dollars. Although I think I've seen it in retail for a little bit less. Let's give this a go. This has, I would have to say this has the darkest color, maybe between the three. Not that it's that big of a difference. Let's give this a smell. More earthy. Yeah, very earthy, stony. I like Lumen wine a lot but I often feel that it needs time to area and open up before it gets its full expression. Yeah, we had the Grenache, we tasted it on video. It showed well but we tasted it over two evenings and it got more and more complex and better and better and better. I have to say and I didn't plan it like this. I actually am preferring the smell on this the best so far. You? Give me a moment. Smoke, flint, pineapple. I get a custard like the Italian custard cannoli type smell. Let's give this a go. It has a very beautiful ampoule. It's like smoky sweet and sour. I mean this is a little bit more expensive. I think it has a little bit better fruit. This is quite good. I have to say this stony earthy flinty lemon mineral it's the fullest embody out of the three wouldn't you say? I mean this is this is fuller in body this is a little more lighter but this is quite nice. I find this to be the most structured, most complicated. It has a lot of mineral flavor and smokiness just plain beautiful. This is more elegant and linear in the mouth, lighter. I feel the acidity and this really stands out to me. Obon Clémont has this place though I would offer this if someone comes to me and say I like Chardonnay that's what I would offer. This is and this is fun and everyone's going to like this. Yeah three it's so hard for me I was thinking I'm like am I ever going to poo poo out of me or the lines but all the lines were showing very strong. Yeah I think I for my palette preference I think I would go 4.3 maybe 4.1 4.1 I would elevate this after smelling this again as well. It's just these are two different styles but similar quality right. Wow very good show anything you want to add on these Chardonnays? Well I think you have if you are really into Chardonnay you know Chardonnay pretty well I would really poo. You're a big fan good wine. So check out I will put the links to these wineries in the description box we're going to do other shows on some higher end more expensive Chardonnays. I'm going to put the discount code for the Zolto glass up on the screen right now you get 15% off the standard glass or the alpha decanter once again we are not affiliates in any way shape or form it's just a nice offer for you if you like this video check out our guide sipping Santa Barbara. Recommend the wines I'm pretty used to it I think he forgot about the stop time though I'm kidding. Anything else you want to add about these wines before we start it off? Yeah definitely check out Santa Barbara Chardonnay it's one of our favorite. This could go with these two could go with meats I think actually. Awesome. Well this I would go with lobster. Okay so anyways guys check it out if you like this video PLEASE subscribe to our YouTube channel. Exactly on Travel and I will see you in the next episode.