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+--- Thread: Still Champagne (/thread-10599.html)
- LLLAMA - 12-22-1999
A number of years ago I was turned on to still champagne. Apparently a limited amount is produced each year using pinot noire grapes. I ordered a few bottles from Dom Peringon.
I have since forgotten the new that the still champagne is sold under and where in the us to get it.
Any ideas?
- tomstevenson - 12-30-1999
Sorry Lllama if you think you've been ignored, but I answered this a few days ago, and it seems to have gone down a black hole somewhere!
The still wines of Champagne are called Coteaux Champenois, and are made in three styles: red, white and rose. Coteaux Champenois Rouge made exclusively from Pinot Noir grapes is the most popular style, and rare examples can be very good, but Champagne is a sparkling wine region where grapes with 8.5% potential alcohol are physiologically ripe, and 10% are so ripe that they're vintage quality. It takes a very hot year indeed to produce grapes that will make a wine with true red wine body, colour and character, especially when you take into account that chaptalisation isore obvious and far less successful for Coteaux Champenois than it is for Bordeaux. Although Bouzy is the most famous village for this style, it is made in many other villages and certain ones, such as Ambonnay, Ay and even Cumieres can be just as good. Good Coteaux Champenois is, however, a much lesser beast than a decent Bourgogne Rouge and far more expensive. Very good Coteaux Champenois is very rare and impossible to predict where it will crop up, not only being confined to truly exceptional vintages, but also to grower X in one village (who will probably not make another wine like it for another 25 years) and, when the next hot year comes along, grower Y in a completely different village. Even then, I have to confess that you can buy much better Pinot Noir than these rarities for much less from Burgundy, not to mention Santa Barbara, Russian River, Oregon etc.
As for buying such wine "from Dom Perignon", I think you must be confused. The only Coteaux Champanois connected with Dom Perignon or indeed Moet & Chandon is Saran, which is a Coteaux Champenois Blanc made exclusively from Chardonnay grapes grown in the vineyards that are reserved for DP (from the vineyards behind Chateau Saran, which is in Chouilly, although the vines come within Cramant). Although it is the most consistent of its style, it is not special, and begins to decline three years after its release (it's a non-vintage blend). About the most remarkable selling point for Saran is that for every bottle produced, two bottles of DPO must be sacrificed (because DP is roughly 50/50 Chardonnay/Pinot) and, of course, they cannot ask anything like the same price. Does that make it a bargain? No, that makes it a foolish waste of raw material, but it's rather quaint if you're a guest at Saran to be served a glass or two as an aperitif. A pure Pinot Noir still wine "from Dom Perignon" does not exist.