Score : 91/100
The Brut Blanc de Blancs Cuvée is a Champagne Palmer & Co non-vintage sparkling wine made exclusively (100%) from Chardonnay.
The grapes are sourced mainly from the village areas of Villers-Marmery and Trépail in French Champagne wine region. These are Premiers Cru vineyards in the Montagne de Reims area. They are blended with Chardonnay wines from the Côte de Sézanne sub-region.
Technical Facts:
Ageing on lees :
- Bottle : 3-4 years
- Magnum : 7-8 years
Dosage : 7-8 g/l
Tasting Notes:
The wine comes in a delicate yellow color, just sightly pale enough to make it elegant.
The nose strikes by its intensity, as well as its lightness.
As you smell, your senses get hit by a large mass of aromas, but they’re subtle, refined and layered. Fresh also which is the most important.
Let’s decompose the bouquet a little: leesy brioche and fresh lemon/lime dominate. But discrete notes of smoke, a floral character and distinctively delicate iodine tones both lift up the experience making it light and airy, and providing complexity. A stunningly tempting smell.
On the palate, the wine confirms its powerfulness and concentration. It’s rather full bodied for a Chardonnay wine with an oily texture backed up by fine creamy bubbles.
A solid acidity drives the balance, joined by silky phenolics on the middle palate. Both together providing and acidic, positively savory mouth-watering feel. Some mineral saltiness accentuates this effect.
Flavorwise, like on the nose, it’s fresh, intense and lifted. Lemon, flowers, and leesy notes. A slight verjus/fresh gress vegetal character on the finish, perhaps what provides freshness to the whole?
Overall
If you decompose this wine like I just did, you will find many layers characteristics and typical of a good Chardonnay Champagne wine, to tease your interest. The lemon/lime is clearly there and concentrated, as well as the briochy character. Dinstinctive minerality and iodine tones are also there.
But if you approach it from a purely hedonistic angle which is really what you want to do with wine, especially with Champagne meant to be enjoyed while celebrating; you will find a concentrated flavorsome bubbly filled with lightness and refined fresh flavors and aromas that should please most palates and most circumstances.
I can see how this could well impress and please crowds of all sorts!
Please let me know your thoughts