Bollinger’s exquisite Pinot Noir Champagne’s – Cote Aux Enfants 2015 & PN TX20

Bollinger, PN, TX20, 6x75cl - £365 per 6 IB (excluding duty and VAT)

Bollinger has launched the latest edition of Cote Aux Enfants and their new “PN” cuvée – a Blanc de Noirs showcasing a specific 1er Cru or Grand Cru village, in this instance, Tauxières, in Champagne’s Marne region.

The PN series, now its 6th rendition, pays homage to Pinot Noir (PN) in its pure form and nods to the current wave of interest in site-specific Champagnes. Tauxières (TX) makes up 48% of the blend, complimented by grapes from by Aÿ and Avenay. In a sunny and dry year, this terroir thrives, and Bollinger has 18 hectares here in one huge block. The wines of the year were then blended with 52% of reserve wines, stored en magnum, from three amazing vintages: 2019, 2012 and 2008. These add a great deal of complexity and texture to the blend.

As the only Blanc de Noirs in the Bollinger portfolio (save for Cote aux Enfants and the very rare and expensive VVF), it won’t come as any surprise that the wine is masterfully detailed, with lovely red hedgerow berries and fleshy citrus fruit. It exhibits orange rind and grapefruit bitterness with just a hint of nutmeg and vanilla. Cream drenched pastry juxtapose perfectly with savoury soy and umami notes and a vibrant floral lift. It is incredibly young and virile yet somehow vinous, saline and mature – blind, you would struggle to know if the wine was young or old. Every iteration seems to grow on the last, as the Bollinger team continue to hone and perfect this cuvee.

Bollinger, La Cote Aux Enfants, Ay, Blanc de Noirs, Grand Cru, 2015 - £745 per bottle IB

Also released is the 2015 Cote aux Enfants. While not from the same Prephylloxera plots as the fabled VVF, this cuvee has all the hall marks of its more expensive relative - Incredibly rich red berry fruit - cherry, raspberry and wild strawberry. Bruised apple, orange blossom and some tropical mango and papaya notes. Brambles, lemon thyme and lashings of vanilla and cream. A delicate persistent umami backbone exhibits sea salt, oyster shell, limestone and proving bread dough. This showcases such impressive weight and intensity beautifully overlaid by acidity, tension and freshness.