NV Caillez-Lamaire Eclats Extra Brut
– Nose: Mosel Meets Damery
– Stony Skeletal Quality
– Red Fruits, Orchard Fruits
– Mild Citrus Fruits
– Airy Minerals
– Palate: Precise as a Laser
– Utterly Delicious
– Complex Like You Cannot Believe
– Precise Richness
– As Good an Under $42 Champagne That Exists
NV Caillez-Lemaire Reflets Extra Brut
– My Favorite Geeky Under $35 Champagne We Sell
– 50% Pinot Meunièr, 35% Pinot Noir and 15% Chardonnay
– A Blend of the Geeky and the Delicious
– Nose: Terrific, Huge Complexity
– Yeasty, Toasty, Green Tea, Spice
– Very, Very, Very Aromatic
– Palate: Delicious, Great Freshness and Concentration
– Fruit, Balancing Acidity and Minerality
– Priced like Closeout Bubbly
– Drinks like Very Good mid Tier Champagne ($60ish)
So Long to Swill
You all have those friends who bring industrial Big House Champagne to your house because they know that you are “into wine.” You sip it politely and nod approvingly. It’s somewhere between boring and swill. And there is not a ton of small producer Champagne that’s much better because the good ones start at $50.
Well – forget all of that, because I’ve got 2 great Champagnes today for under $40 that are fantastic. You can drink them every day. Fish. Chicken.
We only care about what’s in the bottle at Fass Selections and dollar for dollar you won’t find anything better than in these two bottles for the money.
The Wines
First up is the NV Caillez-Lamaire Eclats Extra Brut for as little as $43.99 each on a 4-pack and $41.99 on. as 12 bottle case. This is just eerily beautiful and amazingly delicious wine that grabs your attention. Almost like a GG Champagne vibe. Compare at $54 to $75!
The nose is like Mosel meets Damery with its stony skeletal quality. Airy minerals abound. Touch of confectionary notes. Even a hint of caramel. Red fruits as well. Orchard fruits. It’s so nuanced and deep you would never think this is Extra Brut. The nose is so complex you basically need slo-mo technology to fully appreciate it. There is so much going on m the brain cannot fully process it. Intense and powerful aromas of red fruits and compote. Honestly, I can’t even describe everything that is going on. I was swirling and sniffing it for 15 minutes before I even tasted it.There are also some mild citrus fruits (grapefruit and tangelo) as well that are very clearly defined. So clean and such a fresh nose that also is big on the airy minerals. It’s spacious and evocative.
The palate is precise as a laser. There is a sharp beginning with a delicious juiciness that makes you shake your head; there is stunning balance. Again, there is a lot going on. It has a level of across the board palate impact as great Burgundy or top Grosses Gewachs with waves of fruit, acidity and minerality that just hit the palate like repeating shock waves after an explosion. There is superb structure. A salty, saline, biscuits mineral goodness just envelops this It has absolutely some of the finest mousse out there. It’s not DP/Krug mousse, but the level below which is super impressive for a Champagne under $50 (it would be $75 3 tier). The fruit is there but more of a suggestion but the tart tangy cherries bring to mind wonderful Beaune reds. The mineral expression of the fruit is just remarkable. The concentration is very impressive. The complexity is just spectacular if that is what you are after, but besides being complex, which is appealing in a cerebral way, it is also just ridiculously delicious because of the soft mousse and exquisite balance. After it airs the nose has just a mineral stank that is right in my wheelhouse. Umami for days. And the length. It has the cling that truly great wines have. It becomes a part of your palate but in an ethereal way. It has the structure for 10-15 years evolution in the bottle.So crunchy, silky and nutty with terrific and intense fruit. There is sap, and I mean serous sap, loads of yeastiness and a quiet intensity. Utterly delicious. Stunning flavor intensity for an entry level wine. The wine is not messing around. It is complex like you cannot believe and almost BONE dry. But for being this dry it is exceptionally balanced and pure. And juicy! It is assertively dry but has such complexity and fruit skin/mineral lusciousness that it not only works, it is masterful.
The blend is 50% Chardonnay (vinified in oak barrels) 25% Pinot Noir (a part in oak barrels, a part in inox vats) and 25% Pinot Meunier in inox vats. It is 50% barrel fermented and 50% barrel maturation, so despite its skeletal brut nature quality, it has heft and weight to it. It’s complex and so dry that I would only drink it as an aperitif or with fresh oysters. Maybe some caviar. It is insanely delicate, yet penetratingly deep and has so many angles it would make Euclid jealous. But not like something that has sugar. This shows so well after 2-3 hours and really picks up steam on day 2. The richness, that is just a part of the wine, and if richness can be precise this wine does it. This is less a food Champagne, except for those luxury foods that I mentioned earlier, and more of an aperitif. But it draws you in with its terrific precision, depth and complexity. For me this is a unicorn as it’s very hard to find Brut Nature this good at this price. Almost impossible.
I love selling inexpensive Pinot Meunièr dominated blends. Alas, this is the only one that I know. Today the NV Caillez-Lemaire Reflets Extra Brut can be had for the ridiculously low price of $39.99 a bottle on a 4-Pack and $37.99 on a 12 bottle case. Think $50+ through 3 tiers. $34.99 for a bottle of this is stupid. Yes, stupid. The wine is 50% Pinot Meunièr, 35% Pinot Noir and 15% Chardonnay mostly from from he Valle de Marne. Another “GG” Champagne. Compare at $54 – $90!
Terrific and very complex nose. Yeasty, toasty, some green tea and some spice. A hint of almond. Some smoke, yeast and citrus. Very yeasty and mineral that is nose contrasted also by stark minerals and some hints of lemon and lime zest. Saline, iodine as well, wet rocks, and some toastiness. Beautiful perfume! The acidity in this wine frames the wealth of stark minerals and gorgeous fruit/mineral density .After a bit, some brioche on the nose. Very, very, very aromatic with nuances that change every 15 minutes. Great stuff. Lots of brioche and saline aromas. Also some faint raspberry fruitcake.
Palate is delicious with great freshness and concentration. Loads of red fruit flavors and such nice precision and delineation. The overall palate impact is like a great Grosses Gewachs in that it has fruit, balancing acidity and minerality but there is not a hair out of place. Plus, crazy secondary and tertiary flavors. On the palate there is sap for days like great GG should be, but by no means sacrificing the super finesse-driven house style of Caillez-Lemaire. Palate is rich and structured with lovely sap and purity and finished very mineral but also creamy. Palate is also super elegant and complex with wonderful purity, depth and freshness. Lovely mousse and cut. Terrific sap on the finish Terrific wine and what an epic finish. For what it’s worth this wine is always better on day 2. Best Champagne to open if you’re going to be alone for two nights in a row. Quite sophisticated. So focused but also wild and feral but super clean. The finish is extraordinarily mineral and long. Drinks like $50+.
It is mostly argo-calcaire soil and is fermented 92% INOX and 8% in wood which is a departure from the Jadis I’ve offered which was 100% in wood. It is aged 2 years in bottle and dosed with 7.25 grams of cane sugar. Then it is aged for 2 more years in barrel. It’s amazing what goes into Champagne and even more amazing that it can be here for $34.99 a bottle. It is their most well known cuvee and also a historic cuvee in that Virginie’s grandparents only had Meunier so that is all they could make. It is a somewhat honor bottling to remember their roots. Reflets is the name of the cuvee as it is the reflection of their terroir which is influenced by the River Marne.
The wine is stunning and is surely my favorite geeky under $36 Champagne we have sold. Caillez-Lemaire has 7 hectares of vines and 4 of them are in Damery whilst the remaining 3 are in Cumieres. Pinot Meunier is 50% of the estates plantings with the rest being Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. The terroir is perfectly suited for the low yielding Meunier and when Meunier is great in this area there is nothing like it.
Please call Cheryl at 949 378 5251 after emailing with your firstorder if you are a first time customer (we prefer not to receive credit card numbers over E-Mail).
OFFICE HOURS 4-7 PM
I love drinking and selecting wines – but my passion for teaching people about wine is almost as big. I’m happy to announce a block of time each day where people can call me just to chat about wine in general. These blocks are NOT intended to sell wine (I do that all day). This is to talk to me about wine pairings or great producers or how long to age wines or styles of wine making or the latest wine controversy. My goal is to help people learn more about wine and enjoy it more. Call me at 917-912-4355 from 4-7EST Monday – Friday.
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