2024 The Hilt Estate Chardonnay Sta Rita Hills

This is what people mean when they say Sta. Rita Hills Chardonnay competes with white Burgundy.

Some vineyards are planted. The Hilt's were chosen — carved into the most brutal, wind-punished corner of the Sta. Rita Hills, the far southwestern edge where Rancho Salsipuedes catches the coldest air off the Pacific. Low-vigor vines that fight for every grape. The elements work against you at every turn, but the toughest terrain for a grower yields the best fruit for a winemaker.

The Hilt is owned by billionaire Stan Kroenke, the architect behind a global sports and entertainment empire spanning the Los Angeles Rams, Arsenal FC, and the Denver Nuggets. When Kroenke builds something, he does so at the highest echelon of human achievement. Nowhere is this relentless pursuit of perfection more evident than in his other wine estate: Screaming Eagle, the undisputed Holy Grail of American wine. The Hilt is forged under that exact same ownership, driven by those exact same uncompromising standards.

Matt Dees runs it from vine to bottle, and he does not make soft wines. Three estate parcels feed this bottling, each fighting the site in its own way: Bentrock on slower-warming calcareous soils, Radian up on diatomaceous earth where the wind is punishing and yields are tiny, and Puerta del Mar out at the westernmost point, where the winery itself sits. Dees has described Radian Chardonnay as drinking like a light saber. That's a fair warning.

In the glass it's lean by California standards and dense anyway — citrus zest, chalk, a wire of acidity down the middle, and just enough oak weight to keep it from going austere. It wants shellfish, cold butter, and a real glass. Serve it cool but not ice-cold, or you'll flatten the mineral.

Most California Chardonnay at this price is trying to taste like butter. This one is trying to taste like rock.