Gosset Grande Réserve Brut

Gosset's flagship non-vintage brut: 45% Chardonnay, 45% Pinot Noir and 10% Meunier drawn from premier Champagne villages including Aÿ, Bouzy and Ambonnay. Aged a minimum of four years in the cellar plus at least six months' rest after disgorgement, with a measured 8 g/L dosage. Lemon meringue and honeyed toast on the nose lead to a rich palate of sustained yellow fruit and brioche, structured by the Pinot Noir, before a balanced, persistent floral finish touched with elderflower.

What sets Gosset apart is a thing it refuses to do. The house blocks malolactic fermentation, so the sharp malic acid stays in the wine. Roundness comes instead from long rest on the fine lees. Each plot is fermented on its own, and the wine is never filtered.

The fruit for this cuvée comes from sixteen villages across Champagne. Aÿ, Bouzy and Ambonnay sit alongside Avize, Le Mesnil-sur-Oger, Vertus and Cumières. The base wines are bottled at the end of the spring after harvest, then go down to rest. Gosset now works from Épernay, where more than 1.7 kilometres of nineteenth-century cellars run beneath a listed park.

Serve it cold, around eight to ten degrees, and let it warm a little in the glass. Start with scallops, then move to roast chicken, turbot or a wedge of Comté. The acidity carries it through richer plates.