Winemaker Notes
Boréal is derived from grapes grown in north-facing vineyards These are unique wines that reveal themselves with time and aeration. They are dense with high-toned freshness and complexity.
Blend: 100% Pinot Noir
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
Coming from north-facing vines on Portlandian soils, the NV Champagne Blanc De Noirs Boreal Brut Nature is a straw copper color and 100% Pinot Noir from 2022. As with all the wines from Clandestin, they use all the press juice, which they believe is crucial to capturing the full identity of the grapes and their terroir. Aged for 12 months in barrel, this wine offers a ripe and full structure, with savory notes of apricot, fresh cereal grain, yellow flowers and salty earth. The mousse is refined, pillowy, and softens its vibrant core of acidity. It's a gorgeous wine to drink over the coming 15 years. Disgorged in 2024.
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Decanter
Clandestin is growing into an ambitious negociant project in Landreville, working with 11 organic growers in the Côte des Bar to put together Champagnes that focus on either north-facing (Boréal) or south-facing (Austral) vineyards. The style at Clandestin is frank, even austere at times, but with a beguiling aromatic complexity and presence from intense fruit and smart oak vinification. It is the cooler, more incisive and precise Boréal cuvée that shines in the hot 2022 base, with some of the juiciness of the year opening up with Comice pear and tangerine fruit before complex layers of jasmine, dried lime and lightly resinous notes. Firm and imposing but not heavy, 100% Pinot Noir. Of other vintage bases in the market, skip 2021 and look for 2020.
Representing the topmost expression of a Champagne house, a vintage Champagne is one made from the produce of a single, superior harvest year. Vintage Champagnes account for a mere 5% of total Champagne production and are produced about three times in a decade. Champagne is typically made as a blend of multiple years in order to preserve the house style; these will have non-vintage, or simply, NV on the label. The term, "vintage," as it applies to all wine, simply means a single harvest year.
Associated with luxury, celebration, and romance, the region, Champagne, is home to the world’s most prized sparkling wine. In order to bear the label, ‘Champagne’, a sparkling wine must originate from this northeastern region of France—called Champagne—and adhere to strict quality standards. Made up of the three towns Reims, Épernay, and Aÿ, it was here that the traditional method of sparkling wine production was both invented and perfected, birthing a winemaking technique as well as a flavor profile that is now emulated worldwide.
Well-drained, limestone and chalky soil defines much of the region, which lend a mineral component to its wines. Champagne’s cold, continental climate promotes ample acidity in its grapes but weather differences from year to year can create significant variation between vintages. While vintage Champagnes are produced in exceptional years, non-vintage cuvées are produced annually from a blend of several years in order to produce Champagnes that maintain a consistent house style.
With nearly negligible exceptions, . These can be blended together or bottled as individual varietal Champagnes, depending on the final style of wine desired. Chardonnay, the only white variety, contributes freshness, elegance, lively acidity and notes of citrus, orchard fruit and white flowers. Pinot Noir and its relative Pinot Meunier, provide the backbone to many blends, adding structure, body and supple red fruit flavors. Wines with a large proportion of Pinot Meunier will be ready to drink earlier, while Pinot Noir contributes to longevity. Whether it is white or rosé, most Champagne is made from a blend of red and white grapes—and uniquely, rosé is often produce by blending together red and white wine. A Champagne made exclusively from Chardonnay will be labeled as ‘blanc de blancs,’ while ones comprised of only red grapes are called ‘blanc de noirs.’