Chateau Remy
Remy Martin Australia is very carefully and quietly going about the establishment of several innovative and major brands of Australian wine. Its methode champenoise label, Chateau Remy, keeps a very low profile despite its steadily improving quality and is now being recognised as a potential leader on the Australian market.
Consider the resources available to Chateau Remy and ask yourself why not. There is a large vineyard in the surprisingly cool Victorian region of the Pyrenees, which is slowly being redeveloped to the major sparkling wine varieties of pinot noir, chardonnay and pinot meunier, all of which already play a major role in the wines on the market today.
The winery at Chateau Remy has recently been modified with equipment especially designed to facilitate the methode champenoise process, some of which is unique in Australia. There are the classically French-looking cellars which provide large areas of perfectly temperature-regulated space for the maturation and riddling of wines.
On the personal side there is winemaker Vincent Gere, a young Frenchman destined to go places fast. He must be one of the only winemakers currently working in Australia to have managed the winemaking at Chateau d’Yquem in Sauternes. Hardly a trial run for Chateau Remy, but it speaks volumes for his ability. Imagine working for a company with ownership of and direct access to the combined winemaking talents and experience of Krug, Charles Heidsieck and Piper Heidsieck. Should Gere ever need a second opinion, chances are it will be the best around.
Add to this a typically long-term French philosophy to the establishment of the Chateau Remy brand and the claim made earlier makes total sense. Expect Chateau Remy to release some of the best methode champenoise made in Australia.
The wines released over the last five years have shown a steady improvement as the graftings and new plantings of the Champagne varieties mentioned above increase in yield and maturity. However, thanks to the company’s philosophy of not releasing their wines until a minimum of three years of age, there is a consequent time-lag before the newer wines reach the marketplace. As the proportions of the classic grapes increases there is a measurable development in wine elegance and complexity of fruit characters.
Chardonnay is used in methode champenoise wines for its freshness, and pinot noir for its structure, ageing potential and complexity. Although it is gradually being phased out of the Chateau Remy wines, but hardly completely, I would expect, ugni blanc makes a reliable reserve of natural acidity, which allows the winemakers flexibility with picking time.
Chateau Remy wines have always been noted for their skill in handling the yeast development processes. There are still alarmingly few other Australian producers which keep their sparkling wines for three to five years on lees, despite the increasing French influence on our sparkling wines. Vincent Gere is convinced that sparkling wines begin to extract their yeast character after 9 months on lees. Therefore most Australian methode champenoise wines, which have only satisfied the legal requirement of six months, have absolutely no yeast character to speak of, making the whole process a complete waste of time.
Clearly it comes to a matter of cost.
Chateau Remy boasts some of the most modern equipment in its sparkling wine cellars, and some machinery unique in Australia, as the result of an ongoing programme to maintain and improve wine quality. The Vaslin 4000 press at Chateau Remy is the only example of this classic Champagne press in Australia, and it will shortly be joined by another, to cope with increased vineyard productivity.
Vincent Gere retains delicacy by pressing extremely gently. As in the Chanpagne district itself, only 2666 litres of a possible 4000 are retained for the methode champenoise wines, the balance being removed for distillation.
Chateau Remy’s blending philosophy is unique in Australia. Each of the blends contain 30 reserve from previous years. The present Cuvee Speciale, the company’s flagship, contains material from 1982, 1983 and 1984. Consistency and complexity are the apparent results. The wines are made further complex still by their ‘liqueur d’expidition’, a blend of chardonnay and pinot meunier aged in French oak barrels for two to three years, and like all great Champagnes, topped up with a dose of cognac.
Remy Martin’s winemaking facility at Chateau Remy is now one of the most advanced wineries in Australia, and has an unrivalled advantage in the making of premium sparkling wines.
The results of the recent refurbishment and re-equipping completely transforms the winery to the extent that Chateau Remy genuinely has a new winery. The obvious physical improvement is the roofing over of the entire area which was formerly outside. The walls will be completely finished by Christmas, thereby rendering the winemaking area completely weatherproof.
The changes and improvements have been orchestrated with a single aim:- to put Chateau Remy further ahead in the handling of its wine, and to give Vincent Gere all the resources he requires to herald a new era in Chateau Remy wine quality.
All the old and superseded equipment has been removed – from the old concrete tanks to the distillation equipment. All the old internal fixed lines have been replaced and the entire winery has been completely re-wired.
The list of new equipment is staggering, and it is easy to see where the $1.8 million spent on the redevelopment has gone. A new bottling line, new refrigeration facility, new transfer equipment for magnums and small bottles, and a new disgorging line give winemaker Vincent Gere all the flexibility and surety of operation he requires when handling limited amounts of premium products. The efficiency of the methode champenoise operation has been greatly enhanced with these improvements.
Also completed is a new storage area for finished products and barrels, which gives Chateau Remy the capacity for one million bottles maturing on lees. A range of stainless steel tanks of varying sizes has been installed to give Vincent Gere the ability to handle small batches of wine in trials concerning fermentation and maturation.
In an innovation for Australia, Chateau Remy has received one hundred new small French barrels for the primary fermentation of its sparkling wines, which will undoubtedly contribute to their future complexity and quality. A new laboratory doubles the size of the previous room and is built complete with tasting room and well over $10,000 worth of new equipment.
These exciting and progressive developments will undoubtedly ensure the continued emergence of Chateau Remy as the best producer of Australian Methode Champenoise.
VINCENT GERE
How many winemakers in Australia have run a vintage at Chateau d’Yquem, the home of the world’s greatest sweet wine? Vincent Gere has, when in 1986 he worked day and night to process one of the largest crops ever seen at Yquem – but a year too early to use their brand-new extended underground cellars.
It was incredibly crowded and there was barely room for the growing number of Yquem-filled barrels in the caves. Gere’s problems were magnified with the knowledge that even at that early stage the contents of each barrel was worth a cool $4000!
Last year Vincent Gere joined Remy Martin to act as assistant winemaker for Chateau Remy in Australia. It is a different challenge to most he has taken, which have seen him travel thousands of miles to make wine from Quebec to Marseilles. Chateau Remy is his biggest challenge yet, but it looks certain to remain in safe hands. Michel Diedrich will assist Vincent with this year’s vintage.
He is young to have qualified as a Master of Agronomy and PhD in Viticulture and Oenology at ENSA Montpellier, where he specialised in the selection of soils and climates, and in studies to settle the new Appellation in the Languedoc area. At Montpellier he also researched the technique of cryo extraction, which aims to extract a more flavoursome and sweet extract, with less skin, at pressing.
Gere’s winemaking experience began at Cognac, making cognac and Pineau des Charentes the local aperitif, with a little local, but de-classified red wine as well. But seeing that his father’s winemaking experience was largely in Bordeaux, where he managed the cellars of Pontet Canet 5th Growth and Malescasse 4th Growth in the Medoc, Vincent went there for further experience.
Since then he has spent time in various parts of the world working with wine. He had three months in Canada, where he developed the first vineyard and winery in Quebec, and studied a particularly potent example of a cool climate.
He then completed a vintage at the large Cooperative Marseillan near Marseilles in the South of France, before his experience at Yquem, where he also overlooked Chateau de Fargues. After then travelling Spain and Italy he arrived in Australia to take up his position with Remy Martin in April 1987.
CUV SPEC
Chateau Remy continues to develop its famous Cuvee Speciale along the lines of a classic non-vintage Champagne, using excellent base wines enhanced with blending stocks from previous years. The current cuvee is blended around the 1985 vintage, and contains 70 from that excellent season. The remainder of the wine was selected from reserve material from the 1981, 1982, 1983 and 1984 vintages.
The result is a fuller wine than its predecessor, longer on the palate and with even better balance. Such is its quality and richness of flavour and structure that winemaker Vincent Gere was able to keep it drier than other cuvee blends with a smaller addition of sugar in the expidition. Unusually too, the expidition liqueur did not require the addition of brandy or cognac material.
Chateau Remy places considerable emphasis on the importance of the expidition liqueur and its role in contributing to wine complexity and integrity. For this blend of the Cuvee Speciale the liqueur consisted of three year-old chardonnay which had been matured for that time in five year-old oak small casks.
Vincent Gere describes the Cuvee Speciale as follows:- “Its colour is pale straw and of bright clarity. On the nose are floral and vanillin characters, with yeasty and lees influences. On the palate are flavours of apples and limes. The wine is long, soft and full, with a crisp finish. It is a wine very much in the cuvee style, with great richness and sweet flavours, with a lower sugar level than normal”.
ROSE
Chateau Remy’s Rose Premier is regarded as one of the finest of its style in the country. It is a wine that RMA is committed to developing through increased plantings of the premium Champagne varieties of pinot noir, pinot meunier and chardonnay, which are already coming to yield. For the time being the wine has been made successfully with the tache technique, which involves the development of the rose colour at the expidition stage, but Chateau Remy has already begun to trial its production with a rose-coloured base wine.
Chateau Remy has an understanding of the Methode Champenoise unrivalled in Australia, which is continually enhanced through its relationships with Krug and Charles Heideseck. The colour of the Rose Premier Brut, unlike many of its competitors, is not heavy, for its creators preferred the delicate apricot colour to the pink tinges common in lesser wines.
Much of the secret lies in the actual expidition of the wine. Two liqueurs are used, one red, one white. The red liqueur consists of pinot and cabernet sauvignon which has been aged in barrels for over two years. The white liqueur is a 40:60 blend of chardonnay and pinot meunier, of which the pinot meunier has been wood-aged for three years. The red liqueur contributes the colour, the white adds complexity and sweetness if required.
The combination of liqueurs and their treatments contributes greatly to the complexity of this outstanding product.
Like all Chateau Remy sparkling wines the Rose Premier is only lightly dosed, and finishes at only 3.5 g/L sugar.
The current wine is a blend of ugni blanc, and equal parts of chardonnay and pinot noir. The wine shows excellent strawberry and lichees characters in good volume, and generous yeast flavours. The flavours are intense and well-married, and Vincent Gere believes that they will continue to develop with further cellaring time.
82 VINT
Chateau Remy’s 1982 Vintage, which has received five years, is now a unique and fascinating Australian sparkling wine.
One of the most elegant, classic dry methode champenoise wines on the market is undoubtedly Chateau Remy’s 1982 Vintage. This was proved recently in a tasting of `Methode Champenoise’ wines for “The Australian Classic Dozen”. The 1982 Royal Vintage was selected well ahead of many of the so-called `big names’.
The wine was made from Ugni Blanc and Chardonnay grapes and then aged for five years in the bottle before disgorging, the Chateau Remy 1982 Vintage has received as much care in winemaking as any other wine around. Winemaker Vincent Gere believes it to reveal the Australian character of bottle-maturation in sparkling wine. It is indeed a classic Australian sparkling wine, with wonderful developed toasty characters, great delicacy, acidity and balance. The bead is fine and persistent, as one would expect from a wine with such ageing on yeast lees.
The complexity of the wine was enhanced by the choice of straight chardonnay in its liqueur d’expidition, which has imparted delicate fruit and nut characters.
The 1982 Vintage is drinking superbly now and represents a unique style of sparkling wine. Australia is justifiably proud of its heritage in methode champenoise, and this wine contributes to the history and traditions of sparkling wines in this country.
fin
How do Chateau Remy’s wines compare with other market leaders? Winemaker Vincent Gere compares them to the ‘new wave’ sparkling wines. “Most are simply an aromatic base wines with a second fermentation in the bottle. Many are very intense but simple – pleasant but boring. A methode champenoise wine should continue to develop new flavours for at least ten minutes in the glass after pouring, like ours’. Then you can discover more complexity in the wine, which is what quality is all about”.
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