The Chardonnay quantity deception
Champagne's 'golden child' fails to deliver
People familiar with Champagne know that it is a white wine predominantly produced from black grape varieties. Current plantings in the appellation - according to the Comité Champagne (CIVC) website - are 38% Pinot Noir, 31% Pinot Meunier and 31% Chardonnay. Yet, even if Chardonnay makes up less than one third of the plantings, it actually accounts for a much larger percentage of the finished wines. The reason for this is that Chardonnay has long been the volume cow of the appellation. It is common knowledge - at least in Champagne - that yields in the four areas predominantly planted with Chardonnay (Côte des Blancs; Sézannais, Vitryat and Montgueux) regularly exceed the maximum allowed appellation yield (rendement butoir - RB) of 15,500 kg/ha. Several growers even boast year after year about yields exceeding 20 tonnes per hectare.
In theory, all wines made from grapes exceeding the RB - or Dépassement du Plafond Limite de Classement (DPLC)- are supposed to be delivered to the distillery by December of the next year. However, the calculation of the RB is not per vineyard, but for the whole surface, allowing growers to make up losses in one vineyard with extra grapes from another vineyard. Moreover, the wine delivered to the distillery is just a volume, there is no traceability regarding its origin or even vintage. Hence, at times when houses and cooperatives (and probably also a few growers) need to ‘sort at tank level’ - generally because they purchased and/or processed substandard or rotten fruit - DPLC has become a hot commodity. It is an open secret that the above mentioned Chardonnay subregions have long been well versed in DPLC deals, so much that they often plan certain investments in function of the potential amount of DPLC they can sell.
Officially the system of exchanging defective wines by DPLC is considered to be a qualitative option, but in my opinion, one should wonder why houses commit to low-grade product, especially considering the price per kilo they have paid for these grapes that now need to be replaced…
Chardonnay has long been the DPLC sweetheart because it is more consistent in producing a large crop year in year out. It seems more resistant to downy mildew and grey rot. Moreover it is generally planted on chalk rich subsoils, making it more heat resistant (chalk generally holds quite a lot of water that is readily available for the vine in hotter weather). Lastly and most importantly, it is often planted on volume boosting rootstock, and the selected clones have been chosen because they are high yielding.
It is therefore extremely ironic, that this year, when the commercial appellation (what can be sold as champagne) is at a 3 decade low (except for the 8400kg/ha in 2020 - the Covid year), that the areas that generally produce the most, barely made, or even fell far short, of the 9000 kg/ha required by the commerce appellation. In fact, when this reporter first heard that the Côte des Blancs was very likely not meet the appellation amount, I did not believe it.
