Bowled over by the single origin 2015 wines from Champagne Philipponnat

Website: https://www.philipponnat.com/

Over lunch at the excellent Clove Club, I caught up with Charles Philipponnat and a small band of fellow trade and journalist colleagues as he presented the single-origin cuvées of the house from the 2015 vintage. But to whet the whistle, we began with the excellent Royale Reserve NV based on the 2019 vintage, which I’ve reviewed here before. This is one of the best NV blends at this price point, and a brilliant introduction to Philipponnat. It has 34% reserve wine in the blend, which comes in the form of two perpetual blends, one refreshed with the new wines and one refreshed with reserve wines, in 228 litre and 500 litre barrels, and also foudre. Philipponnat are a small but still significant house, producing around 800 000 bottles a year.

As well as Clos des Goisses, we tasted La Rémisonne and Le Léon, with the three making a nice contrast between site and variety. And then as a treat we looked at the Clos des Goisses Juste Rosé 2014, and the 1999 LV Clos des Goisses, from the last vintage before Charles arrived (he blended it, but it was made before Philipponnat did a big reformation in the cellar, changing the winemaking equipment.

Charles Philipponnat

2015 was a dry vintage, tending to hot. The heat was welcome because dry vintages can result in astringency, and the ripeness of a warm vintage can counter that. All three of these single-site cuvées are above 13% alcohol, so they had to ask for a special derogation. They are powerful, generous wines with freshness and good structure: malolactic was avoided to preserve acidity. The low-ish acid means that it’s down to astringency to help with the structure.

Charles and Isaac McHale (clove club chef and owner)

We also got to hear about the composition of the Philipponnat liqueur d’expedition which is used to add dosage to the wines. It’s new wine (the previous year’s base vintage) with 650 g/l of 100% refined sugar. The Brut wines get 1 cl of this; the vintage wines get 0.5 cl.

THE WINES

Champagne Philipponnat La Rémisonne Mareuil-sur-Ay Extra-Brut 2015
This is from a plot just above Clos des Goisses and is a continuation of the upper terrace, facing S/SW, so it’s slightly more west-facing and has some deeper soils with a bit more clay. Disgorged in March 2024. Fine, fresh, structured and intense with lovely precision to the lemon and red cherry fruit, showing elegance but also some power. Very fresh and fine, with tapering lemony acidity and a little structure, too. This has a crystalline quality and is chiselled and transparent, expanding in the mouth. Such length. 97/100

Champagne Philipponnat Le Léon Ay Grand Cru Extra-Brut 2015
This is a single parcel in Ay from a chalkier area and a more inclined slope. There’s less topsoil leading to more tension in the wine, and in cold vintages the spicy characters can even turn to ginger, says Charles Philipponnat, whereas in balanced vintages they are more peppery. In warm vintages this can be curry-like, with red peppers. This is electric and alive with beautiful shape in the mouth, displaying lemon and cherry fruit with a bit of aniseed and pure lemony acidity. You can feel this at the back and side of the mouth. Pure and chiselled with a lovely acid line. 96/100

Champagne Philipponnat Clos des Goisses Extra-Brut 2015
This site is steeply sloping and faces south, and the soils are quite eroded, with lots of chalk. There are 14 parcels in Clos des Goisses, and also two varieties: Pinot Noir (mostly, 78%) and Chardonnay (22%). It’s a warm, steep, south-facing slope, with really bony mineral soils because of erosion of the top soils. This is very fine and crystalline with powerful lemon and cherry fruit. Such power here: bright with lemon and mandarin, showing great precision. This wine has a real dynamic range to it, with a touch of toastiness alongside the finely structured cherry and lemon notes. This needs time but already shows its potential. 97/100

Champagne Philipponnat Juste Rosé Clos des Goisses 2014
‘Juste’ in this context means ‘hardly’. The first edition in 1999 was made from a base wine that was a blend of red and white wines. After a few years, they decided to concentrate the red wine in the blend by bleeding it, because they found that a longer maceration caused some green notes and extra tannins that they didn’t want. But they found that the saignée wine they produced by bleeding was very interesting, and from then on used the skin-fermented red for the rosé NV and 1522 rosé, while they saved the bled juice for this wine, and they’ve found it ages very well. This spends 24 h-36 h on skins. 2014 was a year of large yields, and a cool harvest: an old-fashioned vintage. Pale pink with a hint of orange, this is precise and linear, with lovely crystalline fruit. There’s some red cherry and cranberry but also some lemon with a tangy finish and astonishing precision. 96/100

Champagne Philipponnat « L.V. » Clos des Goisses 1999
LV stands for Longue Viellisement, and this wine spend 24 years on lees, released 25 years after harvest. 1999 was a cool, old-fashioned vintage with high yields of healthy grapes. ‘The good vintages in the long run,’ says Charles, ‘are not the most intense vintages: they are the purest vintages.’ Of this wine, which was disgorged in March 2024, he says, it is still quite reductive and will be showing its best in two years’ time. Complex, detailed and fresh with some red cherry and fresh mushroom and porcini notes. Very fine with subtle toastiness and a nice acid line. Crystalline in quality. 95/100

For an earlier article (2012) on Philipponnat, including details of its ownership, see here.