Russian River Valley, a subappellation of Sonoma County, is dubbed for the river that runs through this acclaimed AVA. The Russian River, itself, has a cooling effect on the region and gives winemakers plenty of flexibility to make wines in various styles. That includes wines made from a primary white grape: Chardonnay, the star in our latest Tasting Highlights, which features wines that scored 90 points or more on our 100-point scale.

Several of the wines, below, demonstrate Russian River Valley's history with the grape. The generous and intensely flavored Dehlinger Estate Chardonnay comes from eight acres of vines planted between 1975 and 1988 on Goldridge soils (a signature soil for the area). This white offers accents of grilled bread and buttery shortbread on the finish. Likewise, Dutton-Goldfield was founded in 1998 by grapegrower Steve Dutton and winemaker Dan Goldfield. Its reserve bottling is made primarily with grapes from vines that are at least 30 years old and planted across several vineyards. The result is a version with succulent quince, fig and peach flavors.

This lineup also includes De Loach's Chardonnay Russian River Valley 2022, which is generous with citrus, floral and graham cracker notes. Read on to get our score and full expert tasting note for this fantastic California Chardonnay and nine others.

Tasting Highlights' wine reviews are fresh out of the tasting room, offering a sneak peek of our editors' most recent ratings—including scores and full tasting notes—to WineSpectator.com members.