Selosse tasting: Millésime 2009 and 2010, Rosé and Lieux-Dits

To taste Selosse, it is best to start with the idea behind all his work: Champagne treated as a wine, an expression of a specific place. The Jacques Selosse domaine is based in Avize, in the Côte des Blancs, and its methods are best understood with a glass in hand. This tasting journey compares two neighboring vintages, Millésime 2009 and Millésime 2010, then moves on to Rosé and the Lieux-Dits, with a few tips on how to serve them.

Part of the STELT Tasting Week: a journey through the glass each day. The second day was devoted to a tasting of grower-producer Champagne; today we arrive in Avize, home to one of the producers who changed the way people think about Champagne.

Avize, Anselme and Guillaume Selosse

The domaine was founded by Jacques Selosse, Anselme's father. Anselme joined the business in 1974, after studying biology and oenology in Beaune, and took over in 1980. He lowered yields, switched to organic vineyard management and harvested at full ripeness, convinced that a Champagne should not rely on acidity alone.

The vines are mostly Chardonnay, in the grand cru vineyards of Avize, Cramant and Oger, on the chalk of the Côte des Blancs, with a few plots of Pinot Noir in other villages in Champagne. Production remains around sixty thousand bottles a year. Since the late 2010s, the reins have passed to his son Guillaume, who was already working alongside his father; Anselme says he only steps in when Guillaume asks him to. The domaine grows and makes wine only from its own grapes: this is the model of Champagne made by grower-producers.

Wood, oxygen, and solera

In the cellar, everything starts in the barrel. The base wines ferment with indigenous yeasts in wood, mainly in 228-liter Burgundy barrels, and remain there for about a year on fine lees. There are few new barrels: wood is used mainly to regulate contact with oxygen. For this reason, the house style is often described as oxidative, a word that here describes a deliberate choice, not an accident. The result is full-bodied Champagne that are instantly recognizable.

From Spain, and specifically from Jerez Sherry, Anselme brought the solera to Champagne, a fractional aging system that blends vintages. To adopt it, he had to negotiate for six years with the Champagne trade association, and launched it in 1986 using wine from two plots in Avize. Each year, he draws off 22 percent for bottling and replaces it with new wine. The same principle, in a less systematic form known as perpetual reserve, underpins the Lieux-Dits. The dosage is low and does not follow a formula: it is decided by tasting. Aging on the lees lasts many years.

Millésime 2009 and Millésime 2010: two neighboring vintages

The Millésime is the domaine's only wine with the vintage on the label, and is made only in years the Selosses consider suitable. We explained what generally distinguishes a vintage wine from a non-vintage one when discussing vintage or non-vintage Champagne. Here, the focus is narrower: placing the Millésime 2009 alongside the Millésime 2010, same producer and same winery, two different seasons.

On paper, the two vintages are quite different. In 2009, flowering was long and difficult, especially in the Côte des Blancs, but August was hot and dry: healthy, ripe grapes, with acidity in line with the average. 2010 was more complicated. In mid-August, two months' worth of rain fell in two days; botrytis affected the Pinot grapes above all, while the Chardonnay fared better, and few houses declared the vintage. To put Champagne vintages from 1945 to 2024 in context, see the Vintage Guide from STELT.

In the glass, the question becomes how much of the season can still be sensed. Anselme Selosse maintains that in terroir wines, after fifteen or twenty years, vintages end up in the same place. The 2009 is now seventeen years from harvest, and the 2010 sixteen: the comparison falls right within that window. It is best to pour the two wines together, into the same glasses and at the same temperature, and move between them several times. Look at the color and degree of evolution, the fineness of the mousse, the balance between tension and breadth, the savoriness that Anselme attributes to long aging, and the finish. And how each one changes with the air over the course of the evening. If the disgorgement date is indicated on the label, note it alongside the vintage: it helps interpret the differences.

The Rosé and the Lieux-Dits

The Rosé by Jacques Selosse starts with Chardonnay from Avize, joined by a small proportion of Pinot Noir from Ambonnay, on the Montagne de Reims. It does not bear a vintage, as it is made from several harvests, like all the domaine's wines except the Millésime. The bottle in the catalog was disgorged in 2022, a detail to bear in mind when tasting it. During the tasting, it is worth asking what that small proportion of Pinot Noir adds to the Chardonnay: certainly to the color, but above all to the structure and mouthfeel.

The Lieux-Dits shift the comparison from year to place. They are six single-parcel wines, each named after its own lieu-dit: three made from Chardonnay in the Côte des Blancs, in Avize, Cramant, and Le Mesnil-sur-Oger, and three dominated by Pinot Noir, in Aÿ, Mareuil-sur-Aÿ, and Ambonnay. Each combines wine from one harvest with a perpetual reserve from the same parcel, so that the place can speak above all. It is the reverse of the two Millésime: there, the year changes; here, the parcel changes, while the winery remains the same. Those who want to build an evening around this theme will find the Lieux-Dits Collection in the catalog.

How to serve Selosse: glass, temperature, and air

The basic rules are those in our guide on how to serve vintage Champagne. With Selosse, some matter more. First, the glass: if Champagne should be treated like a wine, a large white wine glass is a better match than a flute. The temperature should not be too low: it is best to stay toward the upper end of the range indicated for vintage wines.

Then there is the air. These wines benefit from oxygen: it is best to open them a little in advance, pour a little at a time, and return to the same glass after a while to follow their evolution. When comparing the two Millésime, this evolution is part of the tasting. The Rosé can have its own moment, before or after the vintage wines; the Lieux-Dits call for an evening of their own.

The bottles in this tasting are part of STELT's collectible Champagne selection. At our wine shop in Lucca, on Via Borgo Giannotti, we organize tastings, themed events, and private experiences for small groups of enthusiasts and collectors.