BROUETTE
BORDEAUx, France
about BROUETTE
Brouette Brut Prestige is a Chardonnay Blanc de Blancs Methode Traditionnelle made in Bordeaux. The clusters are pressed whole and the wine is aged for at least 15 months on the lees.
Bordeaux has been making sparkling wines using the Methode Traditionelle at least since the 1800s. If you were to drink it on its own, the base wine used would taste less sweet than a still white wine, because grapes for sparkling wine are picked much earlier. After the base wine is made, the first step in the process is the addition of “liqueur di tirage”, when additional sugar and yeast are added to wine. After that addition, the wine is bottled and sealed not with corks but with crown caps. As the sugars are consumed by the yeast, carbon dioxide is released and, having nowhere to escape, it increases the pressure within the bottle and naturally carbonates the wine.
Next, during Riddling the bottles are stored so that the cork points downward and each bottle is rotated slightly each day, collecting the lees in the neck of the bottle. Next comes disgorgement, at this point the lees have settled near the cork and the winery can carefully freeze the necks of the bottles. When the crown caps are removed, a frozen nubbin of lees will pop out of each bottle, leaving behind clean, clear sparkling wine.
The bottles must then be refilled with a small amount of base wine to replace the volume vacated by the frozen lees. This final step in the process is called dosage. After the dosage process is complete, the bottles are quickly sealed again, this time with traditional champagne corks.
Brouette is fresh and elegant, with fine bubbles and has fragrant aromas of white flowers and stone fruits with hints of brioche. Winemaker Philippe Daguisy graduated from the Winemaking School of Reims in Champagne.
