Champagne Egly-Ouriet 1er Cru Les Vignes de Vrigny NV base 17, disg Oct 2020

Les Vignes de Vrigny is Egly-Ouriet's premier cru Champagne made entirely from Meunier, and the only cuvée in the range drawn from outside the family's Ambonnay heartland.

Egly-Ouriet is a grower estate at Ambonnay, a grand cru on the southern flank of the Montagne de Reims, where Francis Egly took over from his father at the start of the 1980s and now works alongside his daughter Clémence. The holding runs to around twenty hectares across Ambonnay, Bouzy, Verzenay and Bisseuil, farmed organically with regular ploughing and yields cut well below what the appellation allows. Vrigny lies on the western side of the Montagne, in the sector where Meunier rather than Pinot Noir dominates the plantings; the Egly parcel there came through Francis's wife's side of the family and the vines are around forty years old. Only the first pressing is kept, part of the base ferments in barrel with indigenous yeasts, the wine is not filtered, and it spends roughly three years on lees before disgorgement at about two grams of dosage.

Ready to drink and will hold for several years; serve at about 8°C with charcuterie, roast chicken or a mushroom tart.