Dom Perignon, Champagne Brut, 2017 [non-discountable]

One of the smallest and strangest Dom Pérignon vintages ever released. 2017 was a stress-year in Champagne — drought, then rot pressure that decimated the Pinot Noir crop — and Dom Pérignon ended up bottling barely a fraction of normal volume. The blend skews unusually Chardonnay-forward (around 60%, the most Chardonnay-dominant Dom since 1970), giving a wine of seductive tension: the ripe, exotic side of the warm summer pulling against a wiry, mineral, almost saline spine. Chef de Caves Vincent Chaperon — who succeeded Richard Geoffroy and inherited this harvest — has called it a 'wild, exotic' Dom Pérignon. Released after seven-plus years on the lees, as the house has always done. Not a classical vintage; a singular one.