Les Volies Brut Nature 2017

The Chardonnay of this cuvée comes from chalk soils with a clay layer, the Pinot Noir from loamier soils with a chalk and limestone underlay. The yield was 60 hl/ha. The vines are around 40 years old and were ECOCERT certified in 2012. For the base wine, 100 % of Cœur de Cuvée was used. After natural settling, the juice was fermented to 100 % in demi-muids of 600 litres and aged there for nine months. For the champagne, 50 % Chardonnay and 50 % Pinot Noir were used. Around 75 % were from 2018 and 25 % from 2017. The wine matured on the bottle for 36 months. There was no dosage. The champagne was disgorged by hand.

Light golden yellow with relaxed perlage

As the label suggests, this is a champagne whose base wine has been aged entirely in wood. The wood should not dominate, of course, but it should be present. This is also the case with the Les Volies, whose fruit of apricots, peaches, yellow apples and ripe Cedrat lemons is framed by a little wood, nuts and marzipan.

On the palate, the fruit as well as the ageing and the 36-month yeast storage provide elegance, finesse and complexity. The Les Volies is a deep and powerful champagne that is just at the beginning of its development. On the palate, too, it combines mainly stone fruit with citrusy fresh notes and marzipan, lightly roasted nuts and a wood that never creeps into the foreground and is nevertheless present as a component of the overall work. This already seems coherent, but one should follow how this champagne develops further.