2019 Domaine Dame Jeanne, Prémices, Methode Traditionelle Sparkling Wine, Vin de France.
This racy, mineral driven and dry bubbly by Domaine Dame Jeanne is a 100% Pinot Noir Methode Traditionelle sparkling wine that shows off a grower Champagne style palate with leesy opulence, subtle citrus, wet stones and a reductive nuttiness on the lighter framed medium bodied palate. The Burgundy based Domaine Dame Jeanne was all new to me, thanks to importer Pepite Wines for introducing me to this exciting producer and especially this delicately golden Prémices bottling that I really loved when I tried it recently. There’s an array of lemon, peach, quince and hazelnut in the mouth along with chalky, saline, faint florals and doughy yeasty accents that are kept lively by the energetic small bubbles in the wine’s mousse, making for brilliant almost extra Brut style sparkler that will go great with oysters and other briny sea foods. Coming from Chatillonais, a cool climate terroir most famous for Crémant de Bourgogne, is in the northernmost part of Bourgogne sits on a stony, clay-limestone soil that dates from the Jurassic period.
Youthfully confident and talented vigneron Jeanne Piollot, who is the daughter of two Champagne winemakers, Roland Piollot and Dominique Moreau started doing her own wines in 2017, when she took over a small winery in Chatillonais, not far from Chablis, as mentioned above, is a little known Northern Burgundy region, noted for bubbly. This pretty, but slightly austere Prémices Methode Traditionelle bubbly, crafted from sustainably grown Pinot Noir, set on limestone and clay soils, with direct pressed white juice was fermented exclusively in stainless steel tank. The wine, as Piollot notes, was then aged for 2 years sur lattes before disgorgement without any dosage, which explains the contrast of supple richness and dry restraint found here. This is a naturally balanced and compelling sparkling wine and whets the imagination for future releases and I look forward to following Jeanne Piollot’s efforts. The Domaine Dame Jeanne wines are rare and geeky cool, so they will be hard to find in your local wine merchants, so I suggest following Pepite Wines in the States to learn more about the latest releases and or buying them directly trough them. Pepite has an interesting portfolio of small wineries from France, mostly that do limited bottlings and natural/organic wines.
($44 Est.) 92 Points, grapelive