Frederic Savart 1er Cru Les Noues Champagne Extra-Brut 2022
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The Land
Most of the Montagne de Reims is built on chalk. Ecueil is not, and that is the whole point of this bottle. The village sits on the northwestern spur known as the Petite Montagne, rated 90% premier cru, and its 144.5 hectares run to sand and sandy clay with only patches of chalk underneath. Sand is warm and fast-draining. It ripens Pinot Noir early and gives it flesh and red fruit rather than the taut, austere line chalk imposes. Ecueil leaned into that long ago: 76% of the village is Pinot Noir, far more than its neighbors, and growers here still talk about a local heritage selection, the pinot fin d'Ecueil. Les Noues is one parcel inside that.
The Wine
Les Noues is a blanc de noirs, 100% Pinot Noir from the single Ecueil parcel, vinified and raised in barrel like everything in this cellar, and finished as an extra-brut. Savart works in 350 to 500-liter casks with restrained toast, and parcel wines like this one typically get around ten months in wood before bottling. The proportion of new oak has moved by vintage, from around 50% in earlier releases to far less recently. The barrel gives width and light spice, not sweetness. Ripe citrus, white peach, wild strawberry, white flowers and brioche, then a fleshy, sappy middle and a long chalky-saline finish with a fine pepper note at the very end. The 2022 growing season ran big and clean: drought through summer, timely rain, the earliest harvest start on record on August 20, healthy fruit with no rot, and an appellation yield of 12,000 kg per hectare, the largest since 2008.
The People
Rene Savart founded the domaine in 1947. His son Daniel expanded the holdings through the mid-1980s and sold most of the fruit. The break came with Frederic, who came back to the vines in 1993, pulled the family out of the cooperative in 2001 and took over in 2005. Under him the estate went from selling grapes to one of the most sought-after addresses in the Montagne de Reims, with roughly 80% of a four-hectare production going to restaurants abroad. He plants only Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, farms preventively with cover crops and no insecticides, waits for at least 11 degrees of potential alcohol before picking, and does not chaptalize. This is grower Champagne at its most literal: four hectares, two villages, one set of hands.
Food Pairing
A blanc de noirs with this much flesh can take red meat. Start with duck breast, rendered skin-side down and sliced rare, the fat meeting the wine's acidity and the wild strawberry fruit meeting the duck. Roast pork loin with apples and thyme works on the same logic. For something lighter, salmon rillettes on toast with a lot of lemon, the salinity in the wine picking up the oil in the fish. Or mushrooms sauteed in butter and garlic, folded into soft scrambled eggs. This is the Champagne to open at the start of a long Saturday dinner and still be drinking at the main course.
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Champagne is the northernmost major wine region in France, defined by its cool climate, chalky soils, and centuries-old tradition of sparkling wine production. Centered around the towns of Reims and Épernay, the region is divided into key subzones like the Montagne de Reims, Vallée de la Marne, and Côte des Blancs, each favoring different grapes—Pinot Noir, Meunier, and Chardonnay respectively. The region’s signature chalk and limestone soils provide excellent drainage and impart a distinctive mineral character to the wines. While méthode champenoise was refined here in the 17th century, Champagne’s global prestige grew through the 19th and 20th centuries, cementing its role as the benchmark for sparkling wine worldwide.
