Champagne Monmarthe Solera: Meunier as You've Never Had It

Wine Review

By Jeroen Vonk · WSET Level 3 · CIVC Level 4 · 15 December 2024

I saw this Champagne on Instagram before I ever tasted it. Someone was clearly delighted. I had no idea what it was, but I knew I needed to understand it. One message to Champagne Monmarthe later, I had a bottle on its way to Amstelveen and a conversation in the diary.

Now, having tasted it twice, once during a tasting session with winemaker Gauthier Monmarthe himself, once the day after, alone with more time, I can say: the delight is entirely justified.

The wine

Producer: Champagne Monmarthe Wine: Solera Blanc de Meunier Brut Nature Premier Cru Vintage: NV, perpetual reserve started 2015 Region: Ludes, Montagne de Reims, Champagne Grapes: 100% Pinot Meunier Dosage: Brut Nature (zero dosage) Disgorgement: December 2024 Production: 4,188 bottles Score: 96/100

Why Champagne Monmarthe Made a Solera Blanc de Meunier

Gauthier Monmarthe wanted to make a 100% Meunier champagne. That decision alone is worth pausing on. Meunier, traditionally planted in the frost-prone Vallée de la Marne, on clay-rich soils, has long been the unsung grape of Champagne. Useful in blends for its fruit and softness, but rarely celebrated on its own. Not serious enough. Not mineral enough. Not a grand cru grape.

But Ludes grows Meunier on chalk. And that changes the conversation.

“Normally, we know Meunier more from the Vallée de la Marne, on clay soil,” Gauthier explains. “Here in Ludes, it’s Meunier on chalk. So it’s a different expression. And I like the perpetual reserve Solera method for this cuvée because each year you bring in new wine, bringing freshness. And the character of Meunier on chalk is fruit: very beautiful purity of fruit.”

The solera method Gauthier uses is borrowed from the world of sherry, adapted with precision for Champagne. A large concrete vat, the oldest on the estate and installed by his great-grandfather, holds a perpetual reserve of Meunier that began in 2015. Each year, roughly 30% of the vat is drawn off for the release and replenished with wine from the new harvest. 40% of that new harvest is first vinified in barrels before being added. The rest rests in concrete, holding temperature, preserving fruit.

The first release blended 70% of accumulated reserve, seven vintages deep, with 30% of the 2022 harvest.

Tasting note

Appearance: Clear, medium gold with a warm gleam. The mousse is extraordinary: impossibly fine bubbles, perfectly integrated, described by Gauthier himself with a phrase I won’t try to improve on: “they pop like little flavour explosions in your mouth.” He’s right. It tingles.

Nose: This is where the wine announces itself as something unusual. Orange blossom, jasmine, acacia, the floral register is immediate and generous. Then citrus: lemon, lime, bergamot, strips of orange peel. Stone fruit follows: peach, nectarine, and apricot. Then, more surprisingly, dark fruit: black cherry, blackcurrant, bramble, uncommon for a blanc de blancs-style champagne but entirely natural here, where Meunier retains more of its red-grape character. Herbs (oregano, rosemary, fennel), white pepper, wet stone, chalk. Secondary notes are restrained but present: brioche, toast, a hint of vanilla, and toffee. Tertiary complexity from the older reserve wines: dried fig, dried apricot, caramel, honey, dried herbs. This is a remarkably complex nose for a wine with zero dosage and no barrel character to fall back on.

Palate: Dry, with zero added sugar, yet the wine never reads as lean or austere. The fruit purity Gauthier describes is there, delivering enough apparent sweetness to make the Brut Nature designation feel like a bold winemaking statement rather than an ascetic one. Acidity is medium-plus: fresh, clean, carrying. The body is full, fuller than many blanc de blancs champagnes, and richer than Meunier’s reputation might suggest. Flavour characteristics mirror the nose across all three registers: citrus and stone fruit from primary, brioche and yeast from secondary, dried fruit and caramel complexity from tertiary. The finish is long.

Quality: Outstanding.

What makes this wine different

Other champagnes use perpetual reserves. There are other 100% Meunier cuvées. There are other Brut Natures. What’s rare is all three at once, from a single village, on chalk, with this level of execution.

The concrete vat is central to understanding the result. It maintains temperature without adding flavour, protecting the fruit character that Gauthier identifies as Meunier’s defining quality on chalk. The wine doesn’t taste of a vessel; it tastes of a place and a method.

And then there’s time. Seven different harvests are in the glass right now. When this wine is ten, fifteen, or twenty years into the solera, the complexity will be something else entirely.

“In the future, the goal is to bring maybe 20, 30, 40 years of different vintages into the glass. I’m very excited to taste it.”

Verdict

This is the champagne that surprised me most in recent memory. It challenges Meunier’s reputation, challenges the expectation that zero-dosage means austerity, and challenges the idea that Ludes is a supporting-cast village. Accessible, almost immediately generous, and yet the more time you spend with it, the more it gives back.

Open it with food: scallops, fatty fish, aged hard cheeses, charcuterie, roasted vegetables with herbs. Or open it and pay attention.

Only 4,188 bottles were made. Find them.

Where to find it: Available in the Netherlands and Belgium via Vinetiq.nl and on: → champagne-monmarthe.com

🎙️ Coming soon on Sparks by VinoVonk

I sat down with Gauthier Monmarthe himself to taste this wine and hear the full story, seven generations of family winemaking in Ludes, the philosophy behind the solera, and what chalk does to Meunier that clay simply can’t.

The episode drops in two weeks. Subscribe now so you don’t miss it:

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