100% Grand Cru, particularly satisfying Pinot Noir here. Fresh, bracing red-grape Champagnes with long, swollen mid-palate flavors. Just 5 hectares in size, so availabilities are scarce! Billiot does not filter his wines, and they never undergo malolactic fermentation. That makes them very frisky and reductive when they’re first disgorged, and ccasionally a Billiot bottle will show a slightly metallic aroma for the first few minutes. That’s rare and nil if you hold the wines six months after disgorgement. Billiot seems to want liveliness most of all, as he can presume upon lavish and deep fruit flavors. If you know the wines of Egly-Ouriet (Billiot’s friend and neighbor) they couldn’t be more different.
Egly pulls you down into its mealy-ripe depths; Billiot lifts you up on a billowing fountain of fruit. His wines have marvelous stamina and brightness. They’re hedonistic but not sloppy. Too firm and impeccable to be sloppy!

Edit this Article