A Regional Appellation, a Scattered Vineyard
Crémant de Bourgogne is a regional appellation: it may be produced in the Yonne, the Côte-d'Or, Saône-et-Loire and the Rhône, that is to say across the whole Burgundy and Beaujolais vineyard, the latter forming part of "greater Burgundy" in the sense of the regional appellations. This immense area masks a far more concentrated reality: a few historic centres supply most of the volume.
Nuits-Saint-Georges and Rully are its cradles, together with Tonnerre in the Yonne. At Rully, Fortuné Joseph Petiot-Groffier brought in an eighteen-year-old Champenois, François Basile Hubert, in 1822 to test the local wines' aptitude for a second fermentation. By 1826 the Petiot brothers were selling their bubbles, and in 1830 Hubert founded at Rully the first house specialising in the sparkling wines of Burgundy. At Nuits-Saint-Georges, the Lausseure family was already making traditional-method sparkling wines by 1819, sold from 1821. Today the appellation's great names remain anchored to these places: Rully, Nuits-Saint-Georges, Saint-Bris-le-Vineux, Lugny, Montagny-lès-Beaune.
The Châtillonnais, Crémant's Discreet Kingdom
In the north of the Côte-d'Or, wedged between Burgundy and the Champenois Aube, the Châtillonnais vineyard is the main production basin for Crémant de Bourgogne — and probably the least known wine region in Burgundy. It has no village appellation, no premier cru, no grand cru: its 23 communes produce only regional appellations, Crémant de Bourgogne first among them. Of its 400 hectares in production, about 85% of the crop goes into crémant, the remaining 15% into Bourgogne red, white and rosé and other regional appellations.
This centuries-old vineyard, developed by the monks of Molesme and Cîteaux — Saint Robert of Molesme, Saint Bernard — had almost disappeared by the twentieth century. A handful of stubborn growers, organised into a syndicat as early as 1928, won recognition as AOC Bourgogne in 1985 for Molesme and then in September 1986 for the other 22 communes, over 1,400 delimited hectares. A 120 km Route du Crémant, in the valleys of the Seine, the Laigne and the Ource, links the cellars to the archaeological sites of Mont Lassois and Vix; the Fête du Crémant et du Tape Chaudrons is held at Châtillon-sur-Seine on the third Saturday in March.
The Terroir: Oxfordian Clayey Limestones and Grèzes
The Châtillonnais subsoil explains this vocation. The cuesta that carries the vineyard is made of Oxfordian clayey limestones, harder and harder as one climbs towards the summits. The local signature lies in an amalgamated mixture of hard limestone fragments, the grèzes, from which the syndicat traces the subtlety, depth and aromatic breadth of the wines. The vines wind across often steep, south-facing slopes, where pinot noir and chardonnay reign.
Elsewhere in the area, crémants are born on very different terroirs: the Kimmeridgian marls of the Grand Auxerrois around Saint-Bris-le-Vineux, the Middle Jurassic limestones of the Côte, the clay-limestone soils of the Côte chalonnaise around Rully, the limestones and marls of the Mâconnais around Lugny. What they share is not geological but climatic: these are the slightly cooler, slightly later situations, the ones that preserve the acidity a good base wine requires.
Traditional Method: The Rules of the Game
Crémant must be made by the traditional method, that is by a second fermentation in bottle. The constraints begin long before the cellar: picking is exclusively by hand, into perforated crates to avoid any maceration, and the plots destined for crémant must be registered as early as the spring. Pressing is gentle, sequential and fractional, the first-press cuvée being separated from the tailles, and extraction is capped: 150 kg of grapes may not give more than 100 litres of base wine.
Then comes the blending — wines of the year and reserve wines from earlier vintages — followed by bottling with the liqueur of sugar and yeast. The second fermentation lasts three to four weeks, but the bottles stay at least nine months sur lattes, often much longer, the autolysis of the yeasts bringing texture and brioche notes. Then come riddling, cold disgorgement and dosage: brut between 5 and 15 g/l of sugar, sec between 17 and 35 g/l, demi-sec between 33 and 55 g/l. Final pressure is around 5 to 6 bars, a little less than a champagne — hence, originally, the word "crémant", which described a lighter, more "creamy" mousse.
Four Styles, and Segmentation from the Top
The appellation comes in four expressions. The blended white, which must contain at least 30% pinot noir and/or chardonnay, is the commonest style: ample, fruity, balanced. The blanc de blancs, from white varieties alone and mainly chardonnay, plays on freshness and vivacity. The blanc de noirs, made from pinot noir, is more vinous and more structured, able to hold a whole meal. The rosé, finally, from pinot noir alone or completed with a little gamay, ranges from a very pale, mineral œil-de-perdrix tint to a frankly fruity raspberry.
Since late 2016 the Union des producteurs et élaborateurs de Crémant de Bourgogne has registered in more than forty countries two collective brands intended to segment the top of the range: "Éminent" and "Grand Éminent". These are not wordings from the AOC's cahier des charges but brands carrying more restrictive conditions, chief among them the length of ageing sur lattes — twenty-four months for Éminent, thirty-six months for Grand Éminent, the latter being further reserved for cuvées of pinot noir and chardonnay. A way of saying that crémant is no longer merely the wine of the Burgundian aperitif.
At the Table, and at What Temperature
A blended white Crémant de Bourgogne is served as an aperitif, but its true comfort zone is wider than one might think: blancs de blancs go with fish, seafood and desserts; blancs de noirs, fleshier, stand up to roast poultry or a dish in white sauce; rosés work wonders with starters, grilled meats and red-fruit puddings. Serve them cool but not iced, at around 8°C, in a wine glass rather than a narrow flute.
As for cellaring, these are blended wines designed to be drunk within three to five years of disgorgement. Cuvées given long ageing sur lattes — those carrying the Éminent and Grand Éminent brands, or the houses' vintage cuvées — will take a few more years in the cellar and then gain in toasted, dried-fruit and honeyed notes.