Champagne holds its breath until the Saints de Glace (Ice Saints) are safely past (11, 12, 13 May), dreading a spring freeze that might destroy the future harvest’s fruitful buds.
Desuckering removes the non-fruitful buds (suckers or gourmands). Any unwanted growth is removed to optimise sugar concentration and encourage good sap flow.
The Champagne month by monthIn good years, those wines produced in excess of the cap set for each harvest are set aside for release in the event of a future harvest shortfall. Known as the “inter-professional Champagne wine reserve”, these reserve stocks represent a particularly ingenious solution to the problem of meeting market demand in good and bad years alike, with no loss of quality.
Edmond Cheurlin planted his first vines in 1898 in Celles-sur-Ource on the Côte des Bar. Veuve Cheurlin was established by his grandson Alain in the following century (1978). Ten years later he took command of Jean Arnoult, the oldest Champagne House in the Aube region (1919), owned by his wife Chantal Sandrin.
The Champagne Houses