🍾 Perle d'Ayala 2015

Perle d'Ayala 2015 is the 2015 release of Perle d'Ayala by the house Ayala, a vintage white Champagne in the Extra Brut style.

According to the house, this is the 13th Perle vintage, marking 30 years of the cuvée; the grapes come from Chouilly, Cramant, Le Mesnil-sur-Oger, Oger and Aÿ; the wine aged more than 8 years on the lees; riddling is done on oak pupitres in the Aÿ cellars and disgorgement by hand; the dosage is 5 g/l.

The house Ayala was founded in 1860 in Aÿ by Edmond de Ayala; according to the house, Chardonnay is its signature grape.

The boundaries of the Champagne area were set by a law of 6 May 1919: parts of the Marne, Aube, Aisne, Haute-Marne and Seine-et-Marne departments. The designation’s specification allows seven grape varieties, dominated by Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier; grapes are picked as whole bunches, that is by hand, and the yield is limited to 10,400 kg per hectare.

According to the Comité Champagne, Champagne is served chilled to 8–10 °C, and bottles are kept in the dark at a steady 10–15 °C, without vibration. An opened bottle is best closed with a sparkling-wine stopper and kept cold.

It is sold under the protected designation of origin Champagne: the bubbles come only from a second fermentation in the bottle, and the wine is aged for at least 15 months before sale (36 for vintage). Extra Brut on the label is an EU sugar term: 0 to 6 g of sugar per litre.

Why it matters to you. The year on the label is the harvest year, so different years of the same line are different wines. The WHO reminds: there is no safe level of alcohol.