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master of wine

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Champagne Bollinger Tasting: 2014 Vintage Release

Posted on September 30, 2022
Champagne Bollinger tasting

In 2029, Champagne Bollinger will celebrate its 200th anniversary. This renowned Maison is one of just three Champagne estates to be owned by the same family since its inception. Throughout its history, Champagne Bollinger has built up impressive global recognition, from its British royal warrant, held continuously for over 130 years, to its role as James Bond’s favourite bubby, and beyond.

Champagne Bollinger is located in the grand cru village of Aÿ, in the Vallée de la Marne. This is prime Pinot Noir country and indeed Bollinger is a decidedly Pinot Noir-centric Champagne producer.  Pinot Noir makes up anywhere from 60 to 100% of all Champagne Bollinger wines.

At a recent Champagne Bollinger tasting in Montréal, 6th generation family member Cyril Delarue related that this Pinot Noir signature is one of the core points of differentiation for Bollinger, giving the wines notable “structure, body, and longevity”.

Champagne Bollinger is both a substantial vineyard owner and a négociant, purchasing up to 50% of its grapes – with near exclusive sourcing of premier and grand cru grapes. Of Bollinger’s 180 hectares of owned vineyards, 151 hectares are located in premier and grand cru villages; notably Aÿ, Avenay, Tauxières, Louvois and Verzenay for Pinot Noir, and Cuis for Chardonnay.

As per many top-quality Champagne producers, Champagne Bollinger only uses the first pressing juice – la cuvée – in its wines. According to the Comité Champagne, “the cuvée is the purest juice of the pulp, rich in sugar and acid. This produces wines with great finesse, subtle aromas, a refreshing palate, and good ageing potential.”

While many Champagne houses prefer to vinify and age their base wines in stainless steel, Bollinger is among the rare houses that retained a focus on oak maturation. The Bollinger cellars house over 4000 oak barrels, managed by their in-house cooper. Oaked blending components go into all of Bollinger’s wines giving them “a rich, broad, textural quality…that is inimitable” said Cyril.

Another major influence on Bollinger’s distinctive style is the very high levels of reserve wines used in their non vintage wines. Reserve wines are still wines, that haven’t undergone secondary fermentation. These aged wines bring significant aromatic complexity and depth of flavour to non vintage Champagnes.

At Bollinger, reserve wines account for more than half of wines like the Bollinger Special Cuvée and Bollinger Rosé. These reserve wines range from five to 15 years of age and are stored in a mix of tanks and cork-sealed magnums. The magnums are bottled with a small amount of liqueur de tirage (sugar and yeast) to provoke a partial refermentation creating small bubbles which keep the wines fresh and pure in flavour.

The selection and blending of reserve wines is a true art. Cyril explained that Bollinger cellar master Gilles Descôtes seeks to express all forms of fruit – from tart, just ripe nuances to heady, dried fruit notes – in his wines. This is a hallmark of Champagne Bollinger, he adds.

To celebrate the Canadian launch of Bollinger La Grande Année 2014, Cyril poured these four lovely wines from Champagne Bollinger.

 Champagne Bollinger Special Cuvée – 94pts. LW

Special Cuvée is a non-vintage blend of over 400 different wines from predominantly premier and grand cru vineyards, made from 60% reserve wine. One fifth of the blend was fermented in oak. The varietal split is 60% Pinot Noir, 25% Chardonnay, 15% Meunier. The bottle tasted was disgorged in December 2021.

Aged over 30 months on lees, the Special Cuvée has an inviting nose, redolent with dried apricot, nougat, ripe lemon, and apple. The palate is crisp and refreshing, with creamy, well-defined bubbles, and an expansive mid-palate. Tangy notes of granny smith apple and lemon mingle with deeper, more savoury, leesy flavours on the finish. Long and relatively dry.

Where to Buy: SAQ ($89.50), LCBO ($91.95)

Champagne Bollinger Rosé – 92pts. LW

Bollinger recently increased the percentage of Chardonnay in the non vintage rosé to soften the blend and make it less “vinous” according to Cyril Delarue. The current blend is very similar to the Special Cuvée in terms of its varietal split, reserve wines, vineyard ranking, and oak. The pale salmon colour is derived from a 5% addition of red wine into the blend.

Fragrant red and dark berries feature on the nose, with underlying hints of anise, spring flowers, and candied stone fruits. Really lively on the palate, from its sleek, vigorous mousse to its tangy red fruit flavours, and moderately firm, medium-bodied structure. Finishes dry, with lingering red berry nuances. Very refined in style.

Where to Buy: SAQ ($119.25), LCBO ($123.00)

Champagne Bollinger La Grande Année 2014 – 97pts. LW

La Grande Année is Bollinger’s ultra-premium, vintage release only produced in excellent quality growing seasons – a phenomenon which is becoming increasingly common in Champagne. The blend is composed of 19 different crus, of which 79% are ranked grand cru and 21% are premier crus.

The base wines are vinified and aged in seasoned oak casks (20 years of age, on average) before transfer to bottle and ageing on lees for over seven years. All winemaking tasks, from riddling to disgorging, are carried out by hand.

Despite the mixed review received by the somewhat cool, rainy 2014 vintage, this is a masterful wine. Layers of quince, roasted hazelnut, dried lemon peel, salted caramel, and delicate floral hints unfurl on the nose in rapid succession. The palate has a taut, chiselled quality with savoury, lemony flavours, and ultra-fine, highly persistent bubbles. Hugely concentrated and multi-faceted with pleasing salinity on the long finish.

Where to Buy: SAQ ($282.00), LCBO ($228.00)

Champagne Bollinger La Grande Année Rosé 2014 – 96pts. LW

La Grande Année Rosé is vinified in the same way as the white, using essentially the same vineyard sourcing. An addition of 5% red wine from a steep, chalky hillside vineyard plot in Aÿ called La Côte des Enfants. This four-hectare Pinot Noir planting is among Bollinger’s most prized vineyard sites.

The 2014 La Grande Année Rosé has a very appealing nose of brioche, mixed spice, and wild berries, reminiscent of a summer pudding. Over time, hints of dried flowers and underbrush emerge. The palate is racy and full-bodied, with juicy red berry flavours deepened by nutty, savoury undertones. Finishes with a dry, subtly chalky texture and lingering fine mousse.

Where to buy: SAQ ($282.00)

Life

The Long Awaited Master of Wine Ceremony

Posted on April 1, 2022
Master of Wine Ceremony

The phone call came on a balmy day in late August of 2020. I had been waiting for weeks. In truth, I had been waiting for years. My dream of becoming a Master of Wine began over a bottle of 1982 Château Léoville-Las Cases. This prized bottle from my father’s cellar was opened to celebrate my imminent departure for Burgundy to pursue my first wine degree.

It was 2004. My father, a great wine lover, beamed at me across the table and declared that this was just the start; that one day I would achieve the title held by the authors of his favourite wine books. I scoffed at the notion, but as the years past the idea kept rattling around in the back of my mind like some pesky pebble in my shoe.

Work, life, travel, love, the prospect of motherhood. I kept finding reasons to postpone my studies. Until, in 2014, after a four-year struggle with infertility, it was time to make some radical changes.

I finally applied to the Institute of Masters of Wine, started planning a move back to Canada, and of course, promptly found out that I was pregnant. And so, the course for the next six years of my life was set.

No photo description available.
Me attempting to study for the MW with young children at home…!

To say that I was incredibly nervous and intimidated upon arrival at my first Master of Wine student seminar is a colossal understatement. Showing up five months pregnant did little to help matters. The week took place in Rust, Austria. Every morning, my fellow 50 students and I did practice tasting exams and every afternoon we learned more about the growing, making, packaging, bottling, shipping, and selling of wine around the world.

I came away buzzing with new ideas, new friends, and acquaintances, but also awestruck at how much there is to learn about wine. Books like Stephen Skelton’s Viticulture and David Bird’s Understanding Wine Technology became my bedtime reading.

Over the next few years, I studied like a have never studied before. I rocked my baby in his little chair with one foot while blind tasting. I spent weekends learning about rootstocks and soil pH. I made dozens of recordings so that I could listen to theory notes while walking the dog or chopping onions for dinner. I bought a coravin so I could taste wines again and again.

My studies took me to wine regions across the world, and to study centres in California and England. All the while, my network of Masters of Wine and MW student relationships grew. And so did my family. A second pregnancy with a due date uncomfortably close to the second stage exams meant that I had to defer for a year. I spent 2017 fretting that I would forget all the knowledge I had worked so hard to cram into my recalcitrant brain.

I failed the tasting portion of the exam not once, but twice. My ego was badly bruised, and I started entertaining the fear that maybe I lacked some innate talent or skill and would never make it across the finish line. Perhaps all the time, the money, the stress had been for nothing?

Recovering from a blind sparkling wine tasting.

They say that pride comes before a fall, but I think it depends on its form. When I thought back to my father’s pride at that dinner table so many years before, and that of my mother and husband, who championed me every step of the way, I knew I had to keep going.

I finally passed all parts of the second stage Master of Wine exams in 2019. My sense of relief and joy was immense, as was my trepidation for the next requirement of the study program: a lengthy academic research paper.

Finding a worthy topic that can contribute to the body of knowledge on the subject, that that there is enough material to study but hasn’t already been studied to death, that meets the approval of the Institute, that you feel you can do justice to, and that actually interests you is no easy feat. At least it wasn’t in my case.

When I had found the topic, done the research, and started analyzing it, another challenge presented itself… a global pandemic! So, there I was, with three and five-year-old boys at home all day and a 10,000-word paper to write. The weight of those lonely late night writing sessions was enough to make me want to give up all over again.

Fast forward five months, and the long-awaited phone call. On the other end of the line was Adrian Garforth, Executive Director of the Institute of Masters of Wine.  After some polite chit chat, nearly drowned out by the shouts of my rowdy boys, Adrian laughed and said, “your children seem excited, which is good since there is so much to celebrate”.

Covid restrictions meant that we had to limit the festivities to our small family circle but that didn’t stop us from popping Champagne corks and dancing around the kitchen in wild abandon. It was a magical evening, with the even more exciting prospect of traveling to London for the graduation ceremony.

After 19 long months of covid variant upon loathsome variant, we were finally able to travel to London last week. The event takes place at Vintner’s Hall, the birthplace of the Masters of Wine study program nearly 70 years ago. It is a beautiful old building on the banks of the Thames, all dark wood panelling, plush carpets, and regal portraits.

  • Photo credit: Tucker Images
  • Photo credit: Tucker Images
  • Photo credit: Tucker Images

Liveried trumpeters played as we made our way into the hall, to the applause of our families, friends, and fellow MWs. Though I had had many months for the news to sink in, I still found myself overcome with emotion as I made my way to the stage to receive my diploma. Knowing that my husband, mother, brother, and sister were all there to share the moment filled me with gratitude.

The Bollinger flowed freely as everyone mingled and caught up after the ceremony. Looking across the sea of happy faces it was hard to imagine the distanced, masked, isolated existence we had so recently traversed, and perhaps will again.

The memories of that night will surely stay with me for many years to come. As will every exhausting, exhilarating, overwhelming, terrifying, and jubilant step along the way.

To learn more about the Masters of Wine program, check out the video below.

Life Wines

BURGUNDY REVISITED: WINE TASTING IN BURGUNDY

Posted on March 30, 2019
wine tasting in burgundy

On a cool and blustery day late December, I was speeding along the route nationale 74 in a rented, mint green Fiat 500. My destination? Gevrey-Chambertin to kick off a few days of wine tasting in Burgundy. I smiled as I passed the blink-and-you-miss-it village of Prémeaux-Prissey and a flood of memories assailed me.

I arrived in Burgundy in 2004 to study International Wine Commerce at the CFPPA de Beaune. I didn’t drive stick, my French was lousy, and my only acquaintance was an elderly widow. To make matters worse it was November – the month where a thick, grey fog descends over Burgundy and rarely lifts before the following March.

To say that my first couple of months were challenging is a vast understatement.

I had found accommodations at Domaine Jean-Jacques Confuron in the sleepy town of Prémeaux-Prissey. Slowly but surely my French improved. I made friendships that I cherish to this day. And I drank some incredible wine. If someone had told me back then how lucky I was to be drinking top Burgundy on a regular basis, perhaps I would have sipped it more slowly and thoughtfully.

It has been 12 years since I called Burgundy home. After my formation and a two-year stint sourcing small lots of high-end Burgundy for North American private clients and importers, I moved on, to South Africa, then Avignon, and eventually home, to Montréal. I make the pilgrimage to Beaune most every year though. The siren song of Chambolle always lure me back. And there is nothing quite like popping a warm gougères in your mouth, washed down with a taut, tangy Puligny.

On this particular visit mid December, I was on a fact-finding mission. I have been drinking Burgundy in a fairly nonchalant way these past 10 years. But with the Master of Wine tasting exam looming (and not my first stab at it….sigh), it is time to get serious.

I had tastings lined up at excellent estates from Marsannay all the way down to Givry. The goal was to re-visit Burgundian wine styles and winemaking practices.

Much has changed in Burgundy since the early 2000s. Wine producers are far more ecologically conscience, wines are handled less reductively pre-fermentation, and the percentage of new oak – even at the Grand Cru level – has decreased significantly.

The resultant wines are, for the most part, silkier, lighter, and more ethereal than I remember. The difference between appellations is also less clear cut. Individual winemaking styles and the unique expression of each climat (vineyard plot) distinguishes the wines far more distinctly today.

The following series of articles covers my visits, tastings, and impressions from a few days’ intensive wine tasting in Burgundy.