Champagne Tarlant “Zero” Rosé Brut Nature

Producer

In 1687, Pierre Tarlant began cultivating his first vineyards. At the turn of the 20th century, Louis Tarlant took over as head vigneron. His tenure would prove instrumental to shaping the family legacy, principally due to his involvement as mayor of Œuilly in the rarely discussed Champagne Revolution, a tumultuous movement that you have probably never heard of which led to the French wine classification system, called the AOC. Louis and other fellow growers and small vignerons learned that the large houses were importing grapes and blending them into their wines while still calling them Champagne, leading to outrage and rebellion. As a result, Louis helped achieve worldwide recognition of the AOC in 1911 and contributed to the establishment of the AOC Champagne region in 1927. In the aftermath of these events, Louis swore never to sell a single grape to the big houses again, making Tarlant one of the first independent estates in the region.

Fast forward to today, and head vigneron Benoît Tarlant is the 12th generation working the land under his family name. Benoît is the real deal: his great understanding and respect of history, tradition and nature, coupled with his experimental, forward thinking tendencies have been the driving force of some truly next level, terroir-centric Champagnes. With his sister Mélanie joining the family business in 2003, things are more than ever a family affair. Their estate consists of 14 hectares of vines, 63 parcels within 31 different vineyards farmed solely by Benoît, permitting unparalleled precision in blending decisions for base and reserve wines. In the vines, chemicals are never used and cover crops and biodiversity are prioritized.

Wine Information

Producer: Champagne Tarlant
Cuvée: Champagne “Zero” Rosé Brut Nature
Winemaking: Slow pressing, brief maceration of Pinot Noir, native yeast fermentation, aged 6 months in old oak barrels, then 54 months in bottle prior to disgorging. Zero final dosage.

Time & Place

Region: Œuilly, Vallee de la Marne, Champagne, France
Grapes: 42% Pinot Noir, 37% Chardonnay, 21% Pinot Meunier from 63 parcels of vines. 2018 base wine blended with older reserve barrels.
Terroir: Average 40 year-old vines planted in chalk, Sparnacien clay, and limestone.
The Vintage: 2018 vintage in the Vallée de la Marne produced incredibly lush, fruit-forward Champagnes thanks to a hot, sunny summer following a wet winter.

Why this wine?

Of course, there’s never a bad time for Champagne. However, the Tarlant story is one of French independence and individual resilience in the face of homogenization and modernization. They have stuck to their guns for 12 generations, crafting wines the way they always have even when it wasn’t en vogue to do so. 90% of their production is bottled without a final dosage of sugar, a style represented in less than 5% of the total Champagne market. Their father fought for five years to be able to grow grass between their vines and to stop city trash being thrown into the vineyard as fertilizer. They don’t buy or sell any of their grapes, making them entirely reliant on their farming to make the best wines possible. A success story of sustainability in a region famously uninterested in it. The wine’s pretty freakin’ amazing, too.