🍾 Nicolas Feuillatte Palmes d'Or 2009

Nicolas Feuillatte Palmes d'Or 2009 is the 2009 release of Palmes d'Or by the house Nicolas Feuillatte, a vintage white Champagne in the Brut style.

According to the house, the blend is 50 % Chardonnay and 50 % Pinot Noir. According to the house, it pairs Chardonnay from the Grands Crus of the Côte des Blancs (Avize, Oger, Cramant, Le Mesnil-sur-Oger) with Pinot Noir from the Grands Crus of the Montagne de Reims (Ambonnay, Tours-sur-Marne, Aÿ, Verzy, Verzenay), plus Chardonnay from Montgueux; it was made by the house's cellar master Guillaume Roffiaen.

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.