Shabo Reserve Chardonnay from Ukraine
Living in Turkey I’m pretty well accustomed to outsiders’ surprise that this is a winemaking country. Every once in a while, I get treated to the same surprise about other countries. One semi recent example involved Ukraine and the Shabo Wine Company. I still have not visited Ukraine myself but received this bottle courtesy of a friend who transited through Kyiv.
In 1822 Swiss immigrants established the Shabo Wine Company, based in the town of the same name in Odessa. Between 1882 and the founding of the modern Shabo Wine Company in 2003, the winery saw a lot of history roll by including Ottoman and Soviet invasions. And while the winery has a very slick website with a lot of pages, actual information about its history, current production, etc was thin.
According to the website, its vineyards sit in the Great Shabo CDO (controlled designation of origin) and apparently only Shabo is licensed to produce CDO wines. I don’t know how recent this licensing took place though as the Ministry of Agrarian Policy’s website has no information past February 2019. At that time, Ukraine as yet had no Geographical Indications. The newly formed association of winegrowers and winemakers – Danubian Bessarabia – had just begun its journey to create GIs.
Regardless of whether or not they belong to a GI, Shabo’s vineyards contain a variety of grapes including: Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Merlot, Pinot Noir, Muscat Ottonel, Saperavi, Rkatsiteli, Sauvignon Blanc, Riesling, and Telti-Kuruk. From these, the winery makes classic, reserve, and grand reserve still wines, sparkling wines, and distillations.
Onto the wine I got my hands on!
Shabo Reserve Chardonnay 2015 Tasting Notes
My friend brought me a bottle of Shabo’s Reserve Chardonnay which spent six months in French barrique. My guess is that the barrique had either been used a couple few times given the pale color of the wine and the charming lack of heavy oak-influenced aromas.
Not to say it lacked oak-influenced aromas! Far from it. Here they highlighted classic Chardonnay aromas of apple, citrus, and pear with a grey smoke and made the apples lean more towards ripe, golden flavors.
Firm acidity on the palate combined with moderate alcohol of 12.4% ABV contributed to the wine’s overall medium body. Flavors largely reflected the nose with crunchy golden apples, D’Anjou pears, and citrus flowers.
The Shabo Reserve Chardonnay completely charmed me in the end. I cannot say that I now have plans to rush of to Ukraine to buy more wine; but I’m happy to have had the opportunity to try this one! Hopefully I will manage to get my hands on more in the future.