Penfolds Yattarna named Australia’s finest in James Halliday Chardonnay Challenge

The 2008 Penfolds Yattarna has just been named the best chardonnay in Australia in the inaugural James Halliday Chardonnay Challenge.
Announcing the award via online video from the Yarra Valley, Australian wine critic, author and patron of the competition, James Halliday said: “The extraordinary support for this Challenge is of itself a testimonial to its conception. It also underlines the vast improvement over the past decade in the quality of Australian chardonnays, and the diversity of styles reflecting their varying terroirs”.
When Penfolds first released Yattarna in 1998 from the 1995 vintage, their aspiration was to create a white wine which would rival Penfolds Grange. Over the years, the Penfolds team has refined its winemaking technique and fruit sourcing with grapes for the winning vintage from Tasmania 89% and the Adelaide Hills 11%. The wine was matured for nine months in French oak barriques, 49% of which were new. When it was released in 2011, as a three year old wine, Penfolds Chief Winemaker Peter Gago said: “This Yattarna release, our fourteenth, adds to the credibility of this vintage. Only our best fruit, from our best barriques for our best white.”
For more information on this beautiful drop, please click here.