{"id":14558,"date":"2016-04-28T08:41:21","date_gmt":"2016-04-28T08:41:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/?p=14558"},"modified":"2016-05-01T12:14:04","modified_gmt":"2016-05-01T12:14:04","slug":"in-champagne-day-2-bruno-paillard-selosse-and-gosset","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/champagne\/in-champagne-day-2-bruno-paillard-selosse-and-gosset","title":{"rendered":"In Champagne, day 2: Bruno Paillard, Selosse and Gosset"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"bruno<\/p>\n

Day two in Champagne began at Bruno Paillard, someone who I have featured on this site before (here<\/a> and here<\/a>). Bruno began with an interesting statement: \u2018The true richness of Champagne is the poverty of its soils and the poverty of its climate,\u2019 a comment that was prompted by just how freezing it was, even at the end of April.<\/p>\n

\"bruno<\/p>\n

\u2018You will see plenty of old buildings and kilometres of underground cellars,\u2019 he told us, regarding our upcoming appointments. But, he pointed out, there are particularities about Maison Bruno Paillard. \u2018Like any maison the name on the label is the name of the founder,\u2019 he stated, \u2018and here it is also the name of the owner of the nose who creates the Champagnes.\u2019<\/p>\n

Bruno has a very sensitive nose, and it is this he uses in blending his Champagnes, not his palate. He doesn\u2019t taste the vins clairs, but instead selects them by careful nosing. He took us through a range of still wines from 2015 which will soon be blended.<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

For a Champagne house, Maison Bruno Paillard has a lot of vineyards. All the money he has made since he started the house in 1981 has been ploughed back into buying parcels of vines in good sites: he now has 32 hectares in 89 parcels, from 14 crus \u2013 this is enough for 60% of his requirements.<\/p>\n

\"paillard<\/p>\n

Half of sales of this house are the NV blend, called Premi\u00e8re Cuv\u00e9e, which, like all the wines here is an extra brut. The one we tried is a really attractive wine with subtle toast and refined white peach, pear and citrus fruit. We also looked at the Nec Plus Ultra, Paillard\u2019s top cuv\u00e9e, from the 2003 vintage. This was a very tricky vintage with April frosts wiping out a lot of Chardonnay (this buds earliest), and then a super-hot summer leading to a very early harvest. Yet, by careful site selection, Bruno has managed to produce a remarkable, complex, textured wine of real profundity \u2013 albeit in tiny quantities (4200 bottles).<\/p>\n

\"Anselme
Anselme Selosse<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The next visit was a lovely one, with one of Champagne\u2019s true super-stars \u2013 Anselme Selosse. Selosse is singular in his approach: everything is fermented in wooden barrels (although there are a couple of terracotta vessels in the cellars which were used for the first time in 2015). The juice goes from the press to barrel, and then ferments naturally before the second bottling. The juice goes to the vats for settling after pressing (this is a requirement), but afterwards he resuspends the solids and the resulting cloudy juice goes to barrel with nothing missing.<\/p>\n

\"selosse<\/p>\n

Selosse \u2013 uniquely, I think \u2013 stores some yeast from the first fermentation, freezes it, and uses it in the second fermentation in bottle.<\/p>\n

He believes in minerality. He explained that the plant takes in mineral salts and water, and then photosynthesis creates organic matter. \u2018I want a mineral product,\u2019 he said. His goal in winemaking is to transform the organic material in the grape juice into mineral. He illustrated this by taking a bit from his cigarette packet and burning it. \u2018After the organic parts burn the rest comes from the soil,\u2019 he explained. \u2018I am left with the mineral part.\u2019<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

For Anselme, what really matters isn\u2019t the smell, which changes quite a bit, but the feel of the Champagne in the mouth.<\/p>\n

The wines are truly astonishing. Initial (a blend of 2009, 2008 and 2007) is mineral and intense; VO (9, 8, 7 again) is utterly breath taking with a lovely hint of bitterness and a linear, mineral character; Les Careilles (blending 2003 up to 2009) is structured, savoury and gastronomic; Sous Le Mont from Mareuil sur Ay (blending 04 to 09) is mineral, muscular and with a tart bitterness from the high magnesium; vintage 2005 is another astonishing wine; 2002 is beautifully keen and lemony; and 2003 is attractive and interesting but struggles to throw off the shackles of this vintage.<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

The final visit of the day was at Gosset. Gosset is a Champagne house that still manages to appeal to geeks who\u2019d normally be running after grower Champagnes. This is because of the style of their wines, which is very linear and pure. No oak is used here. Production is around one million bottles, so they are not very small but not very large either.<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

\"OLYMPUS<\/p>\n

The core of their range is a trio of non-vintage blends, which are the face of Gosset. There\u2019s the Grande R\u00e9serve NV, which is a blend of all three main varieties and which shows well balanced cherry and citrus fruit with nice tension. Then there\u2019s the pale, delicate Grand Ros\u00e9 Brut, and finally the excellent Grand Blanc de Blancs. This is relatively new: Gosset relocated to Epernay from A\u00ff a few years ago, and their previous home indicates that the emphasis used to be more on Pinot Noir than Chardonnay.<\/p>\n

Then we tried a new product: 15 Ans, which is the minimum age of the wine in this bottling (it\u2019s actually 17 years old). This is taking a spirits approach to Champagne, and this wine was originally laid down in the late 1990s. It\u2019s intense, concentrated and lively with high acidity and a chalky, grainy savouriness.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Day two in Champagne began at Bruno Paillard, someone who I have featured on this site before (here and here). Bruno began with an interesting statement: \u2018The true richness of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[360],"class_list":["post-14558","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-champagne","tag-champagne"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14558","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14558"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14558\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14625,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14558\/revisions\/14625"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wineanorak.com:\/wineblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}