Jerome Prevost La Closerie Les Beguines LC19

Champagne La Closerie is a tiny grower founded in 1998 by Jérôme Prévost which has gained something of a cult following for its Pinot Meunier-based Champagnes.

Prévost’s 2.2 hectare vineyard, Les Béguines, is in Gueux, 10km west of Reims in the north of the region. Inherited from Jérôme’s grandmother, the site was planted in the 1960s with an old, slow growing, rootstock that descends deeply.

Les Béguines is close to 100% Pinot Meunier, although there is a small amount of Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, and Pinot Blanc, that was planted about a decade ago. The soil of Les Béguines is a layer cake of calcareous sand (Thanetian sand), and clay.

The vineyard management is of course organic, with the soils cultivated and yields kept at balanced levels. Nothing is forced. The fruit is picked ripe and the wine is vinified without any additions in large format, used barrels for 10 months. Bottled unfiltered, Prévost disgorges the wine after roughly 17 months on lees and adds approximately 2g/L dosage. These are wines that always show better after time in bottle, 5+ years is ideal, but even a year or two makes a great difference.

It’s a wine of immense charm and generosity of spirit. Mingling aromas of walnuts, fenugreek, pear, yellow orchard fruit, licorice, white flowers and buttery pastry with evocations of peach and apricot, it’s full-bodied, fleshy and voluptuous, with a broad and textural attack that segues into an ample, enveloping core, concluding with a sapid finish.