Grower Champagne- not just for celebrations!
What is "Grower" Champagne?
Grower Champagne is sparkling wine made in the Champagne region of France that is produced by the same estate (or "grower") that owns the vineyard from where the grapes come. Growers own nearly 90 percent of the vineyards in Champagne. These parcels are valued at close to $1 million per acre!
Only about 4,000 of the approximately 15,000 growers in Champagne though, own more than five acres each. This means that sometimes their production cannot meet their costs.
Therefore, until recently, only the 4,000 growers that own more than the 5 acres made their own wine; the rest sold
their grapes to the big cooperatives like Perrier Jouët and Moët
& Chandon.
These big Champagne houses account
for about 70% of total Champagne production and about 97%
of sales outside Europe. They have long been the "names" people think of when they think of
Champagne.
Recently though, things have started to change for the "little guys". More
growers have begun exporting their wines and more retailers and restaurants have been
buying them. Terroir is probably the reason for this new popularity. Terroir is the French term that describes the identifiable
character of a wine grown in a particular place. Unlike the "big boys", which buy grapes from all over
Champagne (sometimes from as many as 1,000 different vineyard sites),
the "little guy" growers make wines with grapes from a particular place—their particular place. That terroir, along with very competitive prices (often 10 or 20 percent less than the big
brands), has started to cause the Grower Champagnes to become more and more popular—let's hear it for the "little guy"!
Grower Champagnes can be identified by the initials that appear before a number on the wine label. The initials most commonly associated with Grower Champagnes is RM (meaning Récoltant-Manipulant). There are though other initials that may appear on Champagne labels:
NM (meaning Négociant-Manipulant)— are mostly found on labels of the "big boys" that source all their grapes instead of growing them;
CM (meaning Coopérative-Manipulant)— means that there is a cooperative of growers that blend their "juice" to produce one product;
RC (meaning Récoltant-Coopérateur)— is a wine from grapes of one vineyard but it is produced by a cooperative winemaking facility;
SR (meaning Société de Récoltants)— means that there are two growers working together to produce one sparkling wine.
Chartogne Taillet Cuvee St. Anne
We thoroughly enjoyed this sparkler! Light yellow/straw in color. The nose is yeasty with nice apple scents. Tart apple, nuttiness and pears on the palate and wonderful acidity makes this Grower Champagne a wonderful sparkler to drink for any celebration or hanging out with the family playing a board game! From the Wine Library, this bottle came in at about $30.00, which compared to the "big boys" sparklers from France, is a steal!
Cheers!!
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