Why champagne is (again) close the panel to open the panel well
In the first half of 2020, the brutal cessation of exports caused by the world coronavirus epidemic sparked panic between the Reims mountain and the bar coast. For a few weeks, the winegrowers and the champagne houses imagined the worst. Twelve months later, the situation had turned to a speed that has amazed to the most jaded harvesting. "It's incredible", observes Justine Petit-Boxler, the marketing manager of Champagne Le Brun de Neuville, a cooperative Coteaux du Sézannais which has made immense progress since 2008. The COVIvin health crisis could have obliterated all the work of Damien Champy, its president. It has not happened. In large weather, it is not commercial power but the preferential option for the quality imposed for a decade in the 199 members of Le Brun de Neuville which turned out to be a winner. In the footsteps of the Vignerons Crafts who ensure the destinies of the Egly-Ouriet, Larmandier-Bernier, Agraprart, Laherte, Vouette and Sorbée, Jacques Selosse or Jacques Lassaigne champagnes and have imposed their "new wave" champagnes on the map of gourmet restaurants in the world A whole, Damien Champy understood that only its distinction would prevent Champagne from becoming a wine among others while retaining the magic aura essential to a luxury product.
»To read also: our list of 10 best gross champagnes of prestige
We will talk about it this year between oysters and the dunde in chestnuts: unlike the Italian prosecco or the Spanish Cava, who attacked the market for fans of summer "bubbles" with an arsenal of commercial fireworks - orange reflections of APEROL With the tank glasses filled with ice cubes -Champagne has confirmed its letters of nobility by valuing a very long history, various terroirs, dedicated grape varieties and the know -how of men and women who set their hands to the pruning shears, cut, cut, Dressing and kneading like good bread the slow grape to mature harvested at the time of the harvest. Men, and women, therefore! The latter do not hesitate to climb on a tractor, which would have amazed the Ladies of the Champagnes of time in the past, the widows Clicquot, Pommery and Devaux. At the Caves du Forum, 10, rue Courmeaux in Reims, Cédric Pilot notes that the winegrowers are more and more numerous in the appellation. It is Périne Chartogne, in Trois-Puits, on the mountain of Reims; Louise Brison in organic conversion in dawn; The former international dancer Aurore Casanova, who likes the vinifications that are not very interventionist in his Chai de Mardeuil, in the Marne valley.
In front of the forum cellars, at the grocery-dubbing vines with a good food (7, rue Courmeaux), Aline Serva continued the list of these talent winegrowers who are giving a new face to their region By favoring the biological culture of vineyards and plot micro-vintages: Éliane Delalot in Essômes-sur-Marne, Marie Courtin in Polisot, Élise Dechannes aux Riceys. Aline Serva does not display any preference. What matters for her are the "vibrations of the moment". She places the black pins very high that Bénédicte Ruppert and Emmanuel Leroy produce in dawn since 2009. and reports to the curious gourmet champagne and bottled by Salima and Alain Cordeuil in Noé-les-Mallets, to the north, but still on the bars coast. To the good food, where I seated after finding the angel's smile on the Reims cathedral portal, Aline and Éric Serva have repeated what I heard where I had passed since the harvest , To the criers of wines in Troyes (4, place Jean-Jaurès) or to the sacred bistro of Épernay (2, place Auban-Moët): “Today there are wonderful things in Champagne. We discover new names every day. It's fabulous. "In Beaunay, in the hillsides of little Morin, Maxime Oudiette is one of those young winegrowers who will be talked about. "One day, I understood that champagne was not a weak wine which was to fade in front of the bubble," explains this boy with the solid personal convictions who marketed his first bottles in 2000. At the Wine Bar in Reims ( 16, Place du Forum), Camille highlights the Copin Pinot Noir Copin imagined by Alban Corbeaux for the Pierre Deville estate. The average age of consumers attacked at the Wine Bar makes it possible to reassure those who fear that Champagne, like Bordeaux, is a victim of bashing on the part of young drinkers at the Palais formed at the Natural Wine school. The big terroirs in Pinot Noir of the Reims mountain and the bar coast, where the Drappier family delights fans of juicy and crunchy champagne - and even wines without added sulfur - with 1.5 million bottles produced each year, ensure the supply.
In its different states and empires, champagne is doing very well. President of the UNESCO mission, Pierre-Emmanuel Taittinger welcomes it: "In an often anxious world, shaken by inexpensive crises, Champagne has a mission of happiness. The tragicomedy of the month of July 2021, when a Russian law prohibited French producers from writing the word "champagne" in cyrillic on their bottles, is forgotten. In Russian, in English, Japanese or Chinese Mandarin, Champagne, even declined by a counter-label with devaluing mentions, will never be a "Sparkling Wine" like the others. The 300 million bottles that come out each year from the sparkling depths of the champagne cellars have not drowned in the ocean of 5 billion bottles of "Sparkling Wine" produced in the same interval in Italy, Germany, in the United States or in Argentina for the billion members of the new world average class world. , is now based on an allowance system, that is to say on quantities - always more - limited [????? Not clear !!!!] Reserved for longtime customers.
"But the cellars are full and there will be champagne for everyone," says Maxime Toubart, the president of the general union of the Vignerons de la Champagne.We are not going to sell 400 million bottles, but we will finish between 315 and 320 million. "This contrasts with the 244 million bottles sent last year."We had a lot of uncertainties on the speed at which our markets were going to recover," continues Maxime Toubart.Some thought that it would be necessary to wait until 2030. The exit from the crisis proves that people think of champagne.It is a gastronomy product that they want to drink. "
This chain of a situation of concern to a situation of euphoria proves that Champagne remains a very separate wine.Upon growth before the crisis, the French cremant market (Alsace, Burgundy, Loire, Jura) has not yet returned to its positions.After the very beautiful years 2018, 2019, 2020, a difficult 2021 harvest in Champagne, where the quality was good but the average quantity, did not stop joy.In Épernay, the Champagne and Regional Archeology Wine Museum reopened in the old house of Charles Perrier after twenty-two years of closure.Leaving his visit, you can go to the store of the General Vignerons Syndicate, where a hundred members have chosen one of their cuvées.A cup is enough to remember: Champagne is the wine of the very healthy.
To be continued.
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