September 30,2014

Hold the dosage (sugar) please. This is the first time since 1974 that the Louis Roederer champagne house has created a new cuvee. With the warmer weather in Champagne over the recent years the wines were needing less and less sweetening.

The thinking for producing a no dosage champagne started in the very warm year of 2003 in Champagne. Since the champagne house must maintain the house style, his was no small feat for the chief wine maker Jean-Baptiste Lecaillon to create.

The Roederer champagne house is known for its high-quality, age-worthy, and mainly non-malolactic cuvées with minimal oxygen influence during wine making which results in balanced and soft Champagne.

In 2006 for this champagne the grapes were picked when riper than the grapes would normally be for making a brut version. As a result of the lower sugar level the wine making process was altered. 50% of the wine was aged in 9,000 litre oak casks and the pressure was reduced to 4.5 bars vs 6 bars of pressure.

Another effect is that the no dosage also creates earlier oxidation to the wine. Sugars acted as an anti oxidant.

This is a small production cuvee with 60,000 bottles produced. The next warm year to expect a no dosage cuvee will be the release of the 2009 vintage.