The top white wine from Craggy Range – Les Beaux Cailloux Chardonnay – had a four-year break while their Gimblett Gravels Vineyard was replanted. This 2019 is the first in a run of fine vintages that bodes well for the wine’s timely return. A pale straw-gold in the glass, with an elegant but inviting perfume filled with peach, grapefruit, cashew nut, oatmeal, oyster shell and tarragon. Very fine, taut and detailed in a palate that is equal parts succulent and restrained. Complex and layered with a balance at the core that is the trump card. Oak is generous and nutty, acidity is electric, and the fruit is plushly ripe – but not one part outguns the other, rather working in an endless ebb and flow producing a spirited statement throughout. Quite direct and focussed, you’re driven to the finish quite briskly, but it shows excellent length. Look for this to cellar well. 95pts