BIllecart-Salmon - Champagne Brut Sous Bois

Billecart Salmon - Champagne Brut Sous Bois

This champagne was first produced in 2010 with the creation of the maison's refinement cellars and involves vinification in oak wood instead of steel.

This Champagne is the result of the assembly in equal parts of the three main grape varieties permitted in the production of Champagne:

Chardonnay from Premier Cru and Grand Cru of the Côte de Blancs

Pinot Noir from Premier Cru and Grand Cru of Montagne de Reims, Ay, Mareuil-sur-Ay

Meunier from the Marne Valley (right bank of the Marne River)

Dosed at 7 g/L, it is vinified and refined in oak barrels, it only partially undergoes malolactic fermentation and 30-35% of the reserve wines are used in the blend.

It is refined in the chalk quarries that extend for 2 km below the maison for a period ranging from 6 to 7 years.

Curiosities about the cellar:

The Maison Billecart-Salmon is based in Mareuil-sur-Ay in the Champagne region of France, in the Marne department (the river that gives its name to the valley and the department). It is located a short distance from the more famous Épernay and about thirty kilometers south of Reims.

The Maison is today one of the very few large companies in Champagne that can still boast family management and are not led by large groups.

Born in 1818 with the marriage of Nicolas François Billecart and Elisabeth Salmon, the Maison is today led by the seventh generation with Mathieu Roland-Billecart assisted by Antoine Roland-Billecart.

The family property extends over many hectares and the vineyards include 40 Crus, most of which are within twenty kilometres of the city of Épernay between the Marne Valley, the Montagne de Reims and the Cote des Blancs.

Worth noting is the ownership of the vineyards within the Clos Saint-Hilaire (dedicated to the patron saint of the church of Mareuil-sur-Ay), 1 hectare of Pinot Noir vinified alone in a limited edition of 3500/7500 bottles depending on the vintage.

The Maison relies on traditional methods without excluding new technologies and indeed, since 1958, cold racking has been introduced together with low-temperature fermentation to always guarantee the integrity of the wine and maintain intact the finesse and elegance that characterize the Maison's Champagnes.

The vinification takes place in steel tanks at controlled temperatures and a new vinification cellar built in 2000 allows all the parcels to be vinified separately.

In all the labels produced by the Maison outside of the vintage ones, the use of reserve wines in variable percentages is foreseen and these are refined in two separate recently built cellars (2010), one with 400 oak barrels at controlled temperature and the second with 28 foudre barrels (much larger than barriques or tonneaux) of 80 hectolitres each.

In 2018, the maison celebrated 200 years of family management with a special dedicated label produced in a limited edition of 1818 numbered Magnum bottles.