The 2002 NPU – Nec Plus Ultra Extra Brut, a 50/50 blend of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir exclusively from grand cru villages, has a golden color and opens with a beautifully complex and refined bouquet of matured fruit and iodine flavors. Fermented and aged entirely in small oak barrels (pièces) for ten months and then ten years on the lees in bottle, this has lovely oxidation, ripeness and depth. Very pure and fine but wide, highly complex and elegant on the palate, the 2002 NPU combines the famous freshness of the vintage with the complexity of the composition and the bottle aging. The finish is very long, tight, rich and complex but stimulatingly dry, pure and mineral. This is a great Champagne to be enjoyed today or over the next few decades. Total production: 6,200 bottles, plus 300 magnums. The wine I tasted in October 2017 in Hamburg with Bruno Paillard was disgorged in September 2014 and aged another two years in the cellar before it went into the markets. Drink:2017-2050
97 points | Stephan Reinhardt, The Wine Advocate

Made Only in truly great vintages. The first ever N.P.U – Nec Plus Ultra, a 1990 vintage, was released in 2002. Only five have followed since, each of different temperaments: 1995, 1996, 1999, 2003 and now 2002

Of the 320 villages in Champagne, only 17 are entitled to the “Grand Cru” appellation; grapes selected to create N.P.U. “Nec Plus Ultra” are sourced from just four of them: Oger, Chouilly, Verzenay and Mailly. These are the noblest amongst the Grands Crus of the north of Champagne.

The different crus that are blended into the N.P.U are fermented in small wood barriques imparting even more character to a very special wine.

 

 

(BPD6502)

Grape Variety Chardonnay (50%) & Pinot Noir (50%)
Closure Cork
Bottle Size 750ml
Brand Bruno Paillard
SKU BPD6502