Chardonnay

Because it carries whatever is done to it more readily than most grapes. Climate sets the starting point - cold makes it sharp, warm makes it round - and then oak, lees ageing and malolactic fermentation each add weight. A Chablis and a Napa Chardonnay are the same variety handled at opposite extremes.

That the wine was fermented and aged in steel or concrete rather than barrel, so none of the vanilla and toast character from oak reaches it. What is left is the fruit and the acidity. Chablis is traditionally made this way, and Joel Gott's Californian bottling is the New World version of the same idea.

Almost always, and the label rarely says so. Burgundy names wines by place rather than grape, so Chablis, Mâcon-Villages, Meursault and Puligny-Montrachet are all Chardonnay without the word appearing anywhere on the bottle. A small amount of Aligoté is grown there too, but it is bottled under its own name.

The better examples do. Fuller, oak-aged bottles have more to develop on and several here will improve over five years or so. Lighter unoaked styles are made to drink young. Where a producer or critic states a drinking window, it is shown on the product page.