🍾 Nicolas Feuillatte Brut Millésime 2018

Nicolas Feuillatte Brut Millésime 2018 is the 2018 release of Brut Millésime by the house Nicolas Feuillatte, a vintage white Champagne in the Brut style.

According to the house, the blend is 33 % Chardonnay, 33 % Pinot Noir and 33 % Pinot Meunier, aged in the cellar for at least 6 years.

Nicolas Feuillatte is the brand of a growers’ cooperative in Chouilly: the Centre Vinicole de la Champagne, founded in 1972, bought the brand, created in 1976, in 1986.

The boundaries of the Champagne area were set by a law of 6 May 1919: parts of the Marne, Aube, Aisne, Haute-Marne and Seine-et-Marne departments. The designation’s specification allows seven grape varieties, dominated by Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier; grapes are picked as whole bunches, that is by hand, and the yield is limited to 10,400 kg per hectare.

According to the Comité Champagne, Champagne is served chilled to 8–10 °C, and bottles are kept in the dark at a steady 10–15 °C, without vibration. An opened bottle is best closed with a sparkling-wine stopper and kept cold.

It is sold under the protected designation of origin Champagne: the bubbles come only from a second fermentation in the bottle, and the wine is aged for at least 15 months before sale (36 for vintage). Brut on the label is an EU sugar term: less than 12 g of sugar per litre.

Why it matters to you. According to the house, it comes in: a 0.75 l bottle. The year on the label is the harvest year, so different years of the same line are different wines. The WHO reminds: there is no safe level of alcohol.