I need to see a full listing of the dosage and scores, so that I can determine if there’s a sugar bias.
One important fact to remember is that, in general, the same amount of grapes in Burgundy and Champagne results in ~17% more juice in Burgundy. This helps to explain some of the higher yield in Champagne.
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Also, given the warmth the high yields will behave differently. While one can question concentration, if the plants have good health carrying more fruit in a hot year is sensible, especially where one needs to restrain Brix(unusual for Champagne but this is an unusual year) and while small yields will usually yield more concentration and intensity Brix will also rise faster. This may not be a Great year, but it could be that the best possible outcome was enough quantity to replenish depleted stocks with very good wines.
White wine yields are not the same as red wines.
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You’re goals for Brix and acid are different(lower).
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Ripe yellow fruit flavors are not necessarily better than slightly under ripe(in my opinion they’re worse)
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Because you’re pressing immediately you need to be able to extract flavors from the skins and having a higher skin to juice ratio is important. Though cluster morphology varies somewhat by vintage, berries size increases when green harvest is conducted. Terry Theise covers this regarding Riesling.
I do think that 5-7 tons per acre are some serious yields, but in a meter by meter planting that’s doable with a more modest number of pounds per plant. Given the growing season, it’s not unreasonable to think they may pull it off.
My favorite years for white wines in the Willamette Valley in the teens were 2014 and 2017. Yields for whites in 2014 were massive but it was hot enough to get there but still stay balanced and precise. The Pinot Noir was a tougher trick to pull off.
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It’s going to be fun over the next several years as folks trot out “high yields” as a negative for any Champagne “grown” in 2022 - regardless of how good it actually is.
There’s a narrative forming (with some folks), and it will be about as accurate as generic narratives always are.
I don’t know all the logistics/paperwork of the process, but you can move wines around as long as you don’t exceed the limit of the harvest and what you can keep in your réserve individuelle. In general, the réserve individuelle or extra reserves are meant to be used to make up any shortfall in a year’s harvest. At its most basic, this means that you can pull wine from your réserve individuelle to either hit the limit of the harvest or, in some years, the limit of the harvest + an extra specified amount of wines released from the réserve individuelle.
An extreme case of what could happen is as follows: Let’s go back to the harvest of 2018. A producer has a winery and réserve individuelle full of wines from lesser vintages such as 2017. They could harvest in 2018 to the maximum allowed for regular use and addition to the reserve individuelle. To do this, they could discard some of the current reserve individuelle and fill it with wine from 2018. They could then trade out some lesser wines in the winery for the 2018 that is in the réserve individuelle. This would result in a winery with a maximum amount of wine from 2018 that the producer could then do what they wished with - base vintage for an NV, reserve wines for future NVs, or lots of vintage wine.
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High yields definitely don’t equal a poor vintage just as low yields don’t equal a great vintage. 2004 in Champagne is a great example of this and I think 2018 will be another. Heck in 2004, it was not uncommon to see vineyards yield well above 20,000 or sometimes 30,000 kg/ha (I even recall hearing a couple growers claim they hit 40,000 kg/ha). You couldn’t use most of it, but the grapes were healthy and could have been used. 2018 wasn’t quite as big as 2004, but it was close.
IMO, the only thing better quality-wise than a large yield of healthy grapes is a naturally limited yield of healthy grapes. 2018 and 2019 are a great example of this. Both will be wonderful vintages, but early tasting has 2019 a step up because you had no chance at dilution. Everyone pretty much made good wine in 2019 while lesser producers in 2018 made nice wines, but they showed dilution. Quality producers tend to make very good wine in healthy years regardless of the yield.
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100% agreement Brad.
I just worry about some folks setting up a false narrative based on nothing more than yield figures.
Thank you!