L'ASCENDANT BASE 2017 (Champagne MOUZON-LEROUX)

TERROIR

The Grand Cru plots of the estate are located in the Verzy village.
The soils are composed of the famous Campanian chalk which covers the entire Côte des Blancs, and whose sedimentation took place 80 million years ago, at the time of the Upper Cretaceous (Santonian-Campanian).

The region was then covered with a calm and shallow water that was extremely rich in microorganisms whose skeletons formed this chalk of great purity.

In the Montagne de Reims sector, the chalk shows a characteristic that cannot be found elsewhere : it is exceptionally rich in flint, whose presence gives the wines great finesse and precision.
On this terroir, the Pinot Noir brings roundness, and the Chardonnay ensures, by its finesse, its fruitiness and its natural acidity, a perfect cellar potential for those white and black grapes blend.

WINEGROWING & WINEMAKING

L'ASCENDANT is a Solera Champagne. This ageing technique, ordinary used in Spain for making sherry, is rarely used in Champagne. This system consists of different levels of barrels stacked on top of each other, that contain wines of different ages. The ground floor barrel is called solera, and the surmounting upper levels are called criadera.

The wine that is intended for bottling is taken at the solera level that is not totally emptied. The missing liquid is complemented by younger wine coming from the upper level or first criadera, which in turn is completed by the wine of the second criadera, and so on until the last level which will be completed by the winemaker with younger wine. The criadera numbers or level numbers may vary depending on the Champagne houses.

L'ASCENDANT champagne is therefore a Solera of the l'Atavique champagne whose lowest level dates from 2014. This champagne contains more precisely 50% of Atavique 2017 and 50% of the Atavique Solera from vintages 2016 up to 2014. It is then a vine blend (Pinot Noir 60% and Chardonnay 40%) and a Solera vintages blend Champagne. It is bottled without fining or filtration.

After the second fermentation, the Champagne is aged on slats for about 48 months before the disgorgement's operation made without sugar addition at a rate of 1 g/l.

• Blend : 50% Atavique 2017, 50% Atavique Solera since 2014
• Malolactic fermentation : Yes
• Disgorgement Date : April 2022
• Sugar addition : 1 g/l