NV Dehours & Fils Terre de Meunier Extra Brut Champagne 750 ml

It’s possible that in the entirety of Champagne, no one knows more about the terroir of the Vallée de la Marne—or about growing Meunier—than Jerome Dehours.

His family’s Champagne house, Dehours, isn’t large (they have fewer than 15 hectares under vine), but it is varied—stretching across more than forty tiny parcels. That gives him nearly unparalleled insight into how grapes respond to the different soils and expositions across the southern Marne. 

And being the Vallée de la Marne, Meunier is the paint for his canvas: the grape grows so well in this part of the Marne’s left bank that prestige houses like Krug have sourced the grape from their home village of Cerseuil for decades.

The family has grown grapes here for nearly a century, but in the mid-90s, Dehours helped usher in the Champagne’s modern era by starting to bottle bubbles from single plots—there were only a handful of single-vineyard wines then, but his experience was so successful that it’s become a signature for the house.

Their Terre de Meunier shows off the complexity and elegance that Meunier can achieve in this part of Champagne. It’s a blend of two different sites that are both in the village of Cerseuil, Le Patis de Cerseuil and Les Vignes Dans le Bois, plus a tiny amount of reserve wine. They’re the highest vineyards that Dehours own, with Le Patis de Cerseuil facing south, providing a bit more fruit and power, and Les Vignes Dans le Bois facing north, with more cut and drive.

That combination highlights the affinity that grape and soil have for each other here, especially in the hands of such a conscientious farmer like Dehours, who works organically.