2018 Nicolas-Jay Willamette Valley L’Ensemble Pinot Noir, Oregon

Nicolas-Jay is the story of a three-decade friendship between famed Burgundian winemaker Jean-Nicolas Meo and visionary music entrepreneur Jay Boberg, and their shared love of Oregon Pinot Noir. It is also the story of their desire to build something lasting together, while creating a distinctive expression of great Willamette Valley Pinot Noir.

L’Ensemble is a carefully crafted assemblage of individually fermented blocks from some of the finest vineyards in the Willamette Valley.  Production levels are subject to vintage quality, where only the most texturally rich barrels are elevated into this sensational blend.  It took multiple years of vineyard and winery trials to identify and isolate the subtle variations of each site we farm. Then we adjust our farming approach each vintage to liberate a boldness and individualized charisma from the vines that may have otherwise been absent. 

A bright, magenta colour with pinkish red edges shows intensity, youthfulness and concentration. Aroma sequences immediately leap from the glass with freshness and vigour. There are red berries, freshly cut straw, rhubarb and elegantly perfumed red flowers. A blood orange zest intermixes with herbes de provence, cranberries, and tight-grained French barrique. The structure of the wine is medium + at first, but as the wine unfolds in the mid-palate it begins to tighten and constrict. Acid levels are earnest in this wine, but there is a broad density that seems to take a combative stance to its brightness as the finish expands into chalky minerality, tangerine spice and an underlayment of crushed river rock. An argument can be made that this is the most impressive bottling that Jean-Nicolas Méo has achieved yet.