Winemaker Notes
Blend: 100% Chardonnay
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
A blending of recent good vintages, this young-tasting Champagne is at the delicious fruit stage. It is crisp, citrus-flavored and bright with fruitiness. As it develops, the more mineral texture will come through, giving a richer, impressive wine that retains a zesty character. Ideally wait a few months after purchase before drinking.
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Wine & Spirits
Didier Gimonnet focuses this wine on his premier cru vineyards in Cuis, with 20 percent of the blend coming from his grand cru parcels in Cramant, Chouilly and Oger. It’s a classical Côte des Blancs Champagne, a peak expression of chardonnay grown in chalk. Bright and youthful, with clear notes of lemon and white flowers, this turns ornate in the end, bringing a complex hint of aged Gruyère. It’s the freshness and clarity that lasts.
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Jeb Dunnuck
The third wine in the range is the NV Champagne Selection Belles Années Brut, which offers more rounded and fleshy aromas compared to the rest of the range. It is floral with toasted brioche and pear, and a bit more autolytic character. It is full upfront, though it quicky brings the house’s classically driven style back into focus. It has fine texture and is balanced, with more rounded charm. Drink over the next 15-20 years.
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Wine Spectator
Fresh and floral, this finely balanced version offers a delicate mesh of ripe Honeycrisp apple, pickled ginger, blood orange sorbet and chalk set on a fine mousse. Disgorged February 2022. Drink now. 175 cases imported.
A term typically reserved for Champagne and Sparkling Wines, non-vintage or simply “NV” on a label indicates a blend of finished wines from different vintages (years of harvest). To make non-vintage Champagne, typically the current year’s harvest (in other words, the current vintage) forms the base of the blend. Finished wines from previous years, called “vins de reserve” are blended in at approximately 10-50% of the total volume in order to achieve the flavor, complexity, body and acidity for the desired house style. A tiny proportion of Champagnes are made from a single vintage.
There are also some very large production still wines that may not claim one particular vintage. This would be at the discretion of the winemaker’s goals for character of the final wine.
Associated with luxury, celebration, and romance, the region, Champagne, is home to the world’s most prized sparkling wine. In order to bear the label, ‘Champagne’, a sparkling wine must originate from this northeastern region of France—called Champagne—and adhere to strict quality standards. Made up of the three towns Reims, Épernay, and Aÿ, it was here that the traditional method of sparkling wine production was both invented and perfected, birthing a winemaking technique as well as a flavor profile that is now emulated worldwide.
Well-drained, limestone and chalky soil defines much of the region, which lend a mineral component to its wines. Champagne’s cold, continental climate promotes ample acidity in its grapes but weather differences from year to year can create significant variation between vintages. While vintage Champagnes are produced in exceptional years, non-vintage cuvées are produced annually from a blend of several years in order to produce Champagnes that maintain a consistent house style.
With nearly negligible exceptions, . These can be blended together or bottled as individual varietal Champagnes, depending on the final style of wine desired. Chardonnay, the only white variety, contributes freshness, elegance, lively acidity and notes of citrus, orchard fruit and white flowers. Pinot Noir and its relative Pinot Meunier, provide the backbone to many blends, adding structure, body and supple red fruit flavors. Wines with a large proportion of Pinot Meunier will be ready to drink earlier, while Pinot Noir contributes to longevity. Whether it is white or rosé, most Champagne is made from a blend of red and white grapes—and uniquely, rosé is often produce by blending together red and white wine. A Champagne made exclusively from Chardonnay will be labeled as ‘blanc de blancs,’ while ones comprised of only red grapes are called ‘blanc de noirs.’