Crunchy honeydew melon, soft beeswax, white peach. Fresh apricot, raw sugarcane, green mango. Acacia flower and honeysuckle, petroleum jelly and smooth stones. A charming bouquet brimming with green pear, papaya, and passionfruit wafts gently from the glass, deep and profound but not overly sultry. Sweet florals and honey lend a complementary perfume as hints of green coconut and tumeric provide additional complexity. On the palate tides shift abruptly towards crispness as candied lime and green apple skin pulse with tart and intense energy, eventually softening and relenting to lemongrass and lanolin. Medium in body with high acidity and a broad waxy texture that presents itself concurrently with focused stony minerality. This 2018 Walla Walla Valley Sémillon by Amavi Cellars is a bright and delicious Washington white crafted from a unique Bordeaux grape.

Although extremely important to both the sweet and dry white wines of Bordeaux, Sémillon is a grape variety that has hardly received any attention in the USA. When handled properly it has the potential to produce complex age-worthy wines with a distinctly interesting texture yet for some reason it hasn't caught on in many regions outside of its home in Bordeaux. This bottling, crafted by Amavi Cellars using 85% Sémillon and 15% Sauvignon Blanc sourced from within Washington's Walla Walla Valley, is an extremely impressive example of what this underappreciated grape can do in the States. This wine reveals an elaborate fruit profile on the nose and contrasts it interestingly with a lean and tart palate, presenting both tremendous depth and refreshment. It emerges as soft and waxy in the mouth with a wonderful acidic kick and spills out plenty of beautifully delicate power. This is a well balanced and deliberate wine that is extremely fun to both pick apart and simply enjoy.