THE FIELD GUIDE VOL. IX
Filter by cuvée style, chalk cellar lees aging duration, and dosage sweetness.
THE FIELD BOARD
Champagne Styles Explained
House Style • Minimum 15 Months
A blend across several harvests built to taste the same every year. It must rest at least fifteen months, twelve of them on the lees.
Single Year • Minimum 36 Months
Declared only in years the house considers strong enough, and held on the lees for at least three years before release.
White Grapes Only • Chardonnay
Made entirely from white grapes, in practice almost always Chardonnay from the Côte des Blancs.
Black Grapes • Pinot Noir & Meunier
A white wine pressed gently from black grapes, so no colour is extracted from the skins.
Blended or Bled
Champagne is the rare region where blending still red wine into white is permitted, though some houses use short skin maceration instead.
Top of the House Range
The flagship bottling, usually from the best parcels and given far longer ageing than the rules demand.
Récoltant-Manipulant • Marked RM
Made by the same estate that farmed the grapes. Look for the small RM code printed near the bottom of the label.
Zero Dosage • Under 3 g/L
Bottled with no added sugar after disgorgement, leaving the wine bare and unusually dependent on ripe fruit.
Sweet Style • 32 to 50 g/L
Noticeably sweet Champagne, closer to the way the region was drunk in the nineteenth century.
Sweetness Scale
| Label Term | Sugar (g/L) | Taste | Serve With |
|---|---|---|---|
| Brut Nature | 0 to 3, none added | Bone dry | Oysters |
| Extra Brut | 0 to 6 | Very dry | Shellfish |
| Brut | Under 12 | Dry | Anything |
| Extra Dry | 12 to 17 | Off dry | Brunch |
| Sec | 17 to 32 | Lightly sweet | Pastry |
| Demi-Sec | 32 to 50 | Sweet | Dessert |
| Doux | Over 50 | Very sweet | Rich dessert |
Myth vs Fact
MythExtra Dry Champagne is the driest option on the list.
FactExtra Dry is sweeter than Brut. The scale runs Brut Nature, Extra Brut, Brut, Extra Dry, Sec, Demi-Sec, Doux.
Did You Know
Only sparkling wine from the delimited Champagne region of France may use the name. Everything else made the same way is labelled Crémant, Cava, Franciacorta or traditional method.
Behind the Bar
Skip the coupe and the narrow flute for serious bottles. A white wine glass gives the aromatics room, and a chilled bottle opened with a twist of the base rather than the cork keeps the pressure under control.