MONTHAVEN CENTRAL COAST CHARDONNAY - 2008

Packaged in the Octavin Home Wine Bar (3 Liters) with 13.5% alcohol. The fruit is from Santa Barbara and Monterey.

TASTING NOTES:

Gold yellow color with a muted nose of tropical fruits, oak and apple. Clean, smooth, balanced, round with apple and citrus notes.

SCORE & RECOMMENDATION:

85 PTS

This is clearly the best box wine I've ever tasted. After years of pretty much dishing out highly negative commentary on box wines, it is nice to be proven wrong for a change. I've never quite understood why box wine has to be bad. It is simply packaging. Why not put better quality wine in the box if you want to change perceptions? People judge a book by its cover or in this case a wine by its container but the reason they do that is because of prior experiences. While we are probably a long time away from picking up a box of Chateau Haut Brion in box format, maybe this is the start of something out there in the wine world.

This Chardonnay may be straight-forward and lacking complexity but it does a good job of being solid quality. If you are looking for value (the 3L retails for around $24 or the equivalent of $8 a bottle), it definitely delivers. As an entry level Chardonnay this outshines many of the low-end introductory bottles that are often over-oaked and full of alcohol that overwhelms.