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I found the Lustrous Russian River Chardonnay 2023 at Trader Joe’s, selling for $8.99. Precision Wine Company, which makes private-label and retail wine shop wines, appears to have produced it for Trader Joe’s. Their wines can be found at Costco and Trader Joe’s.
The Story
Precision Wine Company produces 22 separate labels along with Trader Joe’s exclusive wine. They are headquartered in Napa and are focused on all parts of winemaking, from harvesting grapes to designing the packaging.
The packaging for the Lustrous Russian River Chardonnay is excellent; the label is gold foil embossed with a leaf pattern. This is a sub-$10 Trader Joe’s wine that has packaging equal to retail wine.
The Russian River Valley is in western Sonoma County, not far from the Pacific Ocean. The Sonoma Coast AVA is to the west of the Russian River AVA. The Russian River ran east to west in ancient times, but a major disturbance caused the river to take a hard northern turn.
The only production details we have for the Lustrous Russian River Chardonnay 2023 is the back label. It reads, “ripe citrus, subtle oak, and a hint of vanilla.”
With the ripe citrus, we can guess that this Chardonnay did not undergo Malolactic Fermentation, which changes the natural tart acid (citrus) to rounded acid (fruit).
The oak and vanilla flavors are oak flavors, typically, Chardonnay, which sees an oak program, also has malolactic fermentation, so this may be a different take on that tradition. The alcohol content is 14.5%.
The Lustrous Russian River Chardonnay 2023 Tasting Notes
The color is a pale sunshine yellow. The nose is tart lemon, butterscotch, spice, green apple, menthol, tropical fruit, and vanilla. The Lustrous Russian River Chardonnay 2023 is rich, balanced, and rather tasty.
This Chardonnay tastes like a stew of peach, vanilla, apple, and lemon, followed by sweet spice, guava, dried pineapple, and and stone fruit.
The acidity is nicely balanced, giving the flavors a solid structure to unfold.
The Summary
- The Lustrous Russian River Chardonnay 2023 is an excellent buy at $8.99.
- It has attractive packaging and is a quality wine.
- This does not taste like a “cookie-cutter” Chardonnay, it is a good tasting change of pace.
