🍾 Vranken Brut Nature

Vranken Brut Nature is a non-vintage white Champagne in the Brut Nature style from the house Vranken in Reims (Marne).

According to the house, the house’s newest range: Champagne with no sugar added at all.

Vranken is a house founded in 1976 by Paul-François Vranken; its home is the Villa Demoiselle in Reims, and according to the house it grows a large share of its grapes itself.

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 Nature on the label is an EU sugar term: less than 3 g of sugar per litre and no sugar added after the second fermentation.

Why it matters to you. No year on the label means it is not a vintage wine: the house may blend wines from different harvests. The WHO reminds: there is no safe level of alcohol.