Alcohol: 12%
Grape(s): 48% Chardonnay, 35% Pinot Noir and 17% Pinot Meunier
Localization: Vallee de la Marne, Epernay, Champagne, France
Tasting Notes: Les Hauts d'Épernay is a champagne offering great concentration and tension. It is a cuvée that has a brilliant golden color and reveals aromas of vine peach, sweet orange, and white fruits. Les Hauts d'Epernay is produced in small quantities and only 3484 bottles are available.
Notes: This vintage was harvested at optimal maturity, vinified in vats and oak barrels, with very little sulfur and very lightly dosed to preserve the natural balance of the wine.
Food pairing: The Les Hauts d'Épernay vintage produced by Philippe Lancelot is a champagne with remarkable balance. This is a cuvée that will be enjoyed as an aperitif as well as with fish or shellfish.
The Domain: Philippe Lancelot is a winemaker who is coming into his own. His family Domaine, Y. Lancelot-Wanner, was first established in 1961 by his grandfather. Philippe’s parents, Yves and Françoise, who had each inherited some vines around Cramant, in Chouilly, Oiry and Avize, as well as in Epernay and Aÿ, took over in 1974. Philippe, who was born in 1980, took over in 2008, after studying viniculture and enology at school in Avize. He is now making Champagne under his own eponymous label as well the family label, Y. Lancelot Wanner. Philippe first became attracted to organic and biodynamic vineyard work after tasting wines from the 1995 vintage from Fleury in the Cotes de Bar. He felt that the wines had an added energy that he hadn’t encountered in other Champagnes. With the advice of Hervé Jestin of Champagne Leclerc Briant, who he considers his spiritual father, and the assistance of Johann Gruson, a soil specialist, Philippe began converting his vineyards to biodynamics in 2012.
Philippe has now fully embraced biodynamic principles, utilizing 500 and 501 preparations, along with essential oils (orange, lemon, etc.) and natural plant applications of comfrey, dandelion, stinging nettle, etc. to treat his vines. In some years, (eg. 2020 & 2021) he has even managed to eliminate copper sulfate treatments from the vineyard and reduce the use of sulfur in his winemaking. The Maria Thun lunar calendar guides his work in the vineyard and in the cellar. The purpose of all of this is to promote auto-immunity in the vines and bring out the best of each vintage. Philippe’s goal is to create vintages with their own identity that speak of individual parcels year after year; wines with balance that require little or no dosage when bottling. His motto is “nature is well done, surely there is nothing better.” This micro-production Champagne house is a name to watch.
