Bollinger PN AYC 18 Base Vintage 2018

Finally, it was time for Aÿ to take center stage in Bollinger's new Pinot Noir series. It wasn't until the fourth edition that one got home to the house's most powerful stronghold and DNA. In comparison to the three previous editions, we are dealing with a tasting winner from the start. The oak notes and the home village's smoky features hit me like a wall of sauna, grilled meat, hazelnuts and tar. The color is deeper than in previous editions and the power stronger than in the first three PN. 47% of the wine comes from the home village in casks both from 2018 and in the reserve wine on magnums from 2009. In between these mighty parts we have steel tank-aged Tauxières, Avenay and Verzenay from the lighter and more mineral-influenced vintages of 2016 and 2017. This particular side takes the biggest place in the middle register and mid-palate of the wine. In aroma and aftertaste, Aÿ pushes forward with its broad muscular shoulders and leaves no one untouched. A bargain with peak 2030–2035!

The latest "PN" release from Bollinger has a great sense of richness and character of both house and variety. Light straw-gold in colour, the nose is smoky and nutty, with bold white strawberry, honeyed peach and brioche on the nose. The palate is creamy, round and fairly full-bodied, the light dosage (6g/l) imperceptible and subsumed by the power of fruit. Textural and gourmand, this is broad and fleshy, stone fruits mixing with more tones of roasted chestnut and toasted brioche. Solar and succulent, it is dense and powerful to a long, supple finish.

PN AYC18 is a showpiece for the expansive dimensions, intoxicating allure and purity of Aÿ pinot noir; a wonderfully characterful blanc de noirs that celebrates the sumptuous fruit generosity of 2018 and the purity and precision of this fabled cru. With the generous tones of a full straw hue and a blush tint, it ripples with grand fruit depth of red cherries and perfectly ripe plums. The magnificent depth of complexity that is Bollinger rumbles in deep reserves, reminiscent of fruit mince spice and dried nectarines. I love that it is so emphatically Aÿ, so intrinsically Bollinger, and yet all transposed with the transparency and delicious fruit generosity that is 2018. It holds fantastic, succulent allure on a very long finish; the ripeness of 2018 translating in supple, silky fruit generosity, yet in no way heavy or broad, beautifully energised by the fine chalk salinity and pure acid freshness that make Aÿ such a beloved place.