"Cuvée Louis Tarlant" Brut Nature (2004 + 2005)
50%Chardonnay/50% Pinot Noir. Created by the Tarlants' parents back in 1982, the prestige cuvée Louis is named for Benoît’s and Melanie’s great-great-great grandfather. Louis was the first to bottle Tarlant estate wine (in 1928) and the one who planted this 0.9 hectare of selection massale Pinot Noir and Chardonnay (in 1946-48). The lieu-dit is named "Les Crayons" in reference to its particularly chalky make-up and is a flat site near the Marne in the Tarlant home village of Oeuilly that yields a "river wine", as the Tarlants refer to it, of fuller body and richer character.
The fruit is hand-harvested and gently pressed; the juice is fermented with natural yeasts in Burgundy barrel. The wines of these two vintages (2004 & 2005) are aged separately in barrel and then blended before bottling, in this case in 2006. That wine is then aged sur lattes until disgorgement with zero dosage, in this case in early 2022. As a rule, Cuvéee Louis is a dual-vintage wine (with occasional exceptions like the 2004 version, which was the first since 1996).