Penfolds Maxs Chardonnay is a tribute to former Chief Winemaker Max Schubert, a legend in Penfolds history. Pale straw in colour with green hues, this wine has a very nice textural and creamy palate with a soft line of acid fading ever so slowly to a distant palate horizon.

Waymaker represents a proud history and future intention of going one's own way. Inspired by Stonyfell Founder Henry Clark, who first dreamt of making wine amongst his olive trees many years ago. Pale yellow wine with green hues. A blend of green apple, grassy and tropical flavours fill the palate to reveal a crisp acidity and medium to long finish.

Attractive stone fruit and citrus aromas with complexity from maturation on fermentation lees. The palate is fine and long with persistent flavour supported by oak structure and length. Will drink well over the next 5 years.

The grapes used to craft The Katana Chardonnay were handpicked, chilled overnight, and whole bunch pressed. The juice was rough settled, and transferred to French oak barriques for fermentation. This process led to the creation of a pale straw coloured wine with golden yellow highlights along the edges. This wonderful Chardonnay presents a supple core of citrus blossom and white stone fruit characters, enhanced by mineral notes. The juicy palate contains flavours of bright fruits and French oak supported by crisp acidity, ending in a lively and captivating climax. This alluring white wine can be enjoyed within 5 years from vintage. Drink it with potato soup, roasted vegetable pizza, and chorizo and sweet potato risotto.

Sitting high in the Adelaide Hills, Sidewood hand craft single vineyard wines of the utmost complexity. Their Chardonnay is made up of four French Chardonnay clones from the Ashwood vineyard and shows a crisp front palate with lifted layers of aromatic fruit. Each clone provides a unique flavour profile to the end result and delivers a wine displaying complex pear, peach & fig fruit flavours with some lovely nutmeg and sage spice notes.

A fine-boned Chardonnay that reflects vintage conditions and the character of a unique vineyard site purchased by Shaw + Smith in 2012. Inaugural vintage: 2014. Planted in 1999, the vineyard has east and west facing aspects and reaches 500 meters above sea level. The soil is brown loam over clay with some broken shale and stone on the ridges. The wine is100% hand-picked and whole-bunch pressed, then fermented and matured on lees in 500-litre French oak puncheons (30% new) for 9 months.

A complex array of melon fig and cashew aromas is followed by a typically elegant and subtle palate with beautifully integrated oak. Petaluma had set a benchmark in Australian Chardonnay.

Sourced and grown in the Adelaide Hills, this is a fine example of how good Chardonnay from this region can be. This is a blend of 3 different cultivars of the Chardonnay grape. Bunch pressed and in part wild fermented. Partial malolactic fermentation imparts further complexity. A beautifully textured and complex wine.

RIPOSTE BY TIM KNAPPSTEIN The Katana Chardonnay, Adelaide Hills