Containing 40% whole bunches, the 2022 Volnay Vieilles Vignes has a splendid bouquet with ripe blackberry and raspberry fruit, a touch of Provençal herbs lending complexity. The whole bunches are very beneficial here. The palate is medium-bodied with pliant tannins, rounded in texture, and quite harmonious with pure raspberry and wild strawberry notes on the finish. Give this Volnay 12 to 18 months in bottle. Frédéric Rossignol greeted me in his barrel cellar on a quiet Saturday afternoon. “There was little stress in the vines, and I’d never seen such high quality of fruit. We started the harvest on August 28 and picked over seven days, starting with the reds and picking according to the vineyard. Everything is picked by hand, even the Passetoutgrain [which I did not taste on this occasion]. Actually, 2023 was more complicated than 2022. That picking started in mid-September, but you’ll taste those next year. The reds will be bottled at the beginning of December.” Not a bad line-up here. I have one or two questions about what I feel was excessive use of stems in the entry-level cuvées. They tended to obscure the terroir, and I’m not completely bought on raising an entire cuvée entirely in glass WineGlobes, which render wines a bit “skinny,” almost “sterile.” But hey, as I said to Rossignol, if you don’t try, you don’t know.(NM)