Translation missing: en.Gosset + Grower Champagne + Alternate Sparkling + André Clouet Champagne Tasting Saturday 7th 3pm-6pm: Gosset + Grower Champagne + Alternate Sparkling + André Clouet Champagne Tasting Saturday 7th 3pm-6pm
Gosset
Gosset is the oldest wine house in Champagne, established by Pierre Gosset in 1584. 16 generations, all of direct lineage, have continued to build upon his work in Aÿ-Champagne and ensured that Champagne Gosset’s savoir-faire, based on the family’s traditional craftmanship, lives on.
"The Gosset style is a great mineral freshness that precedes a deep vinosity.."
Gosset have a great style of Champagne that combines freshness and energy with rich layers of complexity - finding a perfect balance that appeals to both a casual enjoyer of Champagne and to connoisseurs. Gosset have access to the grapes of over 200 growers across 70 different villages, providing them with a large palette of crus with which to work and allows them to create harmonious Champagnes from one vintage to the next, ensuring that the Gosset style lives on and remains instantly recognisable year after year. The Gosset style is owed to a unique vinification process which preserves the natural freshness of the fruit. This process seeks to bring out and preserve the wine's full aromatic expression and ensure a long cellar life, thus offering wine connoisseurs and wine lovers drinking experiences of unrivalled richness, balance and complexity.
We made sure that we had adequate stock of this great estate's Champagne coming into the Christmas period. We've got plenty of the 'Grande Reserve Brut' - an incredible wine for the price and the most representative of the Gosset style. This is made from a 45/45/10 split of Pinot/Chardonnay/Meunier and spends at least 4 years on its lees before disgorgement before resting for another 6 months before release. This wine is fresh, mineral and definitely one of the best Champagnes under $150. We also have a couple of magnum bottles of this. The 'Grande Rose Brut' is Chardonnay dominant but still has plenty of Pinot for a plush body and undergoes the same elevage as the regular 'Grande Reserve'. We also have a single bottle of the 'Blanc de Meunier' left which is distinctive and very hard to find. Finally, we have the 'Celebris Vintage Extra Brut' and the Rose version from the legendary 2008 vintage. These are their top offerings and spend 12 years cellaring before release - only released in outstanding years. These Gosset Champagnes make a perfect gift due to their fantastic quality as well as unique bottle shape and medallion necklace labels. Pick some of these up as Christmas gifts or to enjoy over Christmas and NYE!Grower Champagne
Welcome to the vast and varied world of growers in Champagne. Grower Champagne differs from the Grandes Marques in that these growers own and work their own vineyards themselves, rather than buying in fruit from others. There is a larger focus on creating terroir-expressive wines rather than moulding the wines to an aggregate consumer taste as the bigger houses do. Due to the idiosyncrasy and rarity of a lot of these growers, these bottles make ideal gifts to those that are already wine lovers or someone that appreciates something artisanal and off the beaten path.
The wine region of Champagne is much larger than many people realise. The area planted to vines spans over 34,000 hectares in roughly 320 different villages and home to about 5,000 growers that make their own wine and another 14,000 that only sell their grapes. As the bigger Champagne houses buy their grapes from all over, these styles of Champagne tend to be aggregated and do not speak to their place at all. Grower producers, on the other hand, are champions of terroir and are able to faithfully reflect all the tiny nuances in terroir between plots just like the vignerons of Burgundy would. These growers are much more conscientious and frequently farm using organic/biodynamic methods and are careful in the cellar. These growers are crafting an expression of time and place, not creating sterile, commercialised wines for chain bottle shops.
We stock a wide range of growers but I will highlight a few key growers here. As someone's first foray into the world of grower Champagne, Laherte Freres (we poured these at the Wine Fair) or Larmandier Bernier would be great first choices. These wines are fresh, mineral, expressive and not too challenging for someone that hasn't been exposed to the more radical styles out there. They are also on the cheaper end of top-tier growers making them an easy first step into more carefully crafted Champagnes. Some more unique styles are made by producers such as Bereche, Georges Laval and Vouette & Sorbee. All of these producers farm organically or biodynamically and use little to no sulphur as well as little to no dosage. These wines are incredibly detailed, fine and have potential to improve in the cellar. The extremely sought-after heavy hitters Egly-Ouriet, Agrapart and Suenen represent some of the best growers in all of Champagne. Egly-Ouriet are known for their rich, Pinot-dominant expressions of the terroir of Ambonnay, Agrapart for leaner and more mineral Chardonnay and Suenen for salty, nutty Chardonnay. We have listed some of our favourites from each of these growers below as well as providing the link for our full range. These grower Champagnes are perfect for those wanting to branch out and try some real Champagne or as a gift for the vinous-minded!
Our top picks
Laherte Freres Champagne Ultradition Brut NV (R21 Disg Feb 2024)
Larmandier Bernier Champagne Longitude Blanc de Blancs NV (R20 Disg Nov 2022)
Bereche Champagne Brut Reserve VV NV (R20 Disg Dec 2022)
Georges Laval Garennes Extra Brut NV (R20 Disg July 2022)
Vouette Sorbee Champagne dArgile Blanc de Blancs NV (R19. Disg Oct 2021)
Egly Ouriet Champagne Grand Cru Brut NV (R18 Disg Jul 2023)
Agrapart Champagne Terroirs Blanc de Blancs NV (R20 Disg Mar 2024)
Suenen Champagne Cramant Les Robarts Blanc de Blancs Grand Cru 2016 (Disg Jun 2022)Alternate Sparkling
There is so much more to the world of sparkling wine than just Champagne. Yes, Champagne understandably receives all of the attention, but there are so many other great sparkling wines out there from within France and all over the world in a range of different styles.
We have a range of pet-nats which make for fun, easy drinking sparkling wines that always stimulate conversation at the table. A pet-nat, or Petillant Naturel is a sparkling wine made in the ancestral method whereby the fermentation is stopped and bottled before finishing allowing for some additional fermentation to occur in the bottle, hence the bubbles. Some favourites include: 'Borachio Pash Rash', 'Between Five Bells Pet Nat' and 'Martin Texier Petite Nature'.
There are many other sparkling wines that come from France, often also made in the traditional method, that are not from Champagne and can offer better value as they are not charging the same premium that Champagne can. There are some great sparkling wines coming from Loire Valley (Champalou, Monmousseau), Burgundy (Bailly Lapierre), Jura (Montbourgeau) and Savoie (Domaine Belluard). Most of these are a fraction of the price of Champagne while still offering high quality, unique wines.
Spain also produces their own traditional method sparkling wine known as Cava. These wines come from designated areas around Catalonia, usually from the local grapes: Macabeo, Parellada and Xarel·lo. We have some Cava from Recaredo who is one of the greatest Cava producers that we welcomed into the store for a tasting earlier in the year. These wines are definitely worth checking out if you're looking for a premium non-Champagne sparkling.
Italy also produce a vast range of sparkling wines. Prosecco is one such iconic sparkling wine style from Italy, made from 100% Glera in Veneto with a second fermentation that occurs in a large steel tank rather than in the bottle. This enables the production time and costs to be radically reduced compared to the traditional method. Some of our best Prosecco producers include Il Follo and Bortolin Angelo. There are also a few premium producers making sparkling in the traditional method such as Alessandro Divella and Casa Caterina which are extremely good wines and easily outperform most Champagne in their respective price brackets.
Finally, Australia produces some exceptional sparkling wines which the international wine community is certainly catching on to. Producers such as Nadeson Collis (Geelong), Stefano Lubiana (Tasmania) and Gilbert (Orange) are making some incredible sparkling wines in the traditional method that punch well above their weight. These are a great option to bring to the Christmas lunch to drink some good bubbly while supporting local.
There is a vast world or sparkling wine out there just waiting for you to discover it. Pick up some of these examples and start your journey!André Clouet Tasting
Saturday 7th
3pm-6pm
Come down to the store this Saturday for a tasting of the 2 bottles of Champagne that we are running the excellent Christmas promotion on.
André Clouet is an excellent grower Champagne producer based in the Grand Cru village of Bouzy, specialising in Pinot Noir dominant expressions. These are the wines that we'll be pouring on Saturday:
André Clouet Silver Brut Nature
André Clouet Grande Reserve
The 'Silver' is a 100% pure expression of Bouzy Pinot Noir without dosage and is blend of 65% base wine that spends 36 months on lees and 35% reserve wines that are 2-5 years old that have been stored in tank. The estate refers to this one as "fresh powder" due to it's powdery fine bubbles and glacial texture. The 'Grande Reserve' is also 100% Pinot Noir but sees a small dosage of 4.8-5.6g/L just to add some more succulence to the body and consists of a similar blend to the previous wine but with a 70/30 split instead.
We used to sell these wines for $97/bottle, now we are selling them for a ridiculous $78.20/bottle (no further discounts). This is the perfect chance to try these yourself and then stock up for Christmas before it's too late. Don't miss out on these!