Champagne Krug — BrandWiki

Champagne Krug

Krug Champagne is a Champagne house founded by Joseph Krug in 1843. It is based principally in Reims, the main city in France's Champagne region and is one of the famous Champagne houses that formed part of the Grandes marques. Today the house is majority owned by the multinational conglomerate Moët Hennessy – Louis Vuitton (LVMH) whose portfolio includes other well known wine brands such as Moët & Chandon, Veuve Clicquot, Château d'Yquem and Ruinart. Despite LVMH's majority ownership, the Krug family is still actively involved in all the key decisions of the house but does not manage the day-to-day operations.

Moët Hennessy's Dom Pérignon is often compared to Krug, the latter being described as a "more intellectual wine" by Jancis Robinson.[1]

History

Champagnes

Krug produces mainly Krug Grande Cuvée, supplemented by a non-vintage rosé, a vintage blanc, a vintage blanc de blancs from the Clos du Mesnil in the Cotes de Blancs, a vintage blanc de noirs from the Clos d'Ambonnay and older vintages released as Krug Collection series.

On the nose, Krug is characterized by toasted, grilled, pastry or almond notes born from at least 6 years of ageing sur lies. On the palate, Krug is characterized by notes of fresh fruit, particularly citrus, and a freshness linked to grape selection. Krug does not suppress malolactic fermentation nor does it provoke it, with the majority of its wines not undergoing the process. Its wines are almost invariably dry (never more than 6.5g/L residual sugar).[10]

The Krug line-up of Champagnes currently includes:

Krug Grande Cuvée (non-vintage) A blend of over 120 wines coming from ten or more different vintages – some up to fifteen years in age – and three grape varieties (Pinot noir, Chardonnay and Pinot Meunier) from numerous vineyards. It is re-created on a yearly basis. It is distinguished by its deep golden color and fine bubbles. In total, about twenty years are required to create a bottle of Krug Grande Cuvée, including at least six years during which the bottle sits in the Krug cellars.[11][12]

Krug Rosé is described by the House as a gastronomic Champagne. The fruit of an experiment carried out by Henri and Rémi Krug in the 1970s, the first bottles of Krug Rosé were presented for tasting in 1983, 140 years after the company's founding. Krug Rosé is a blend of three grape varieties, several different vintages from Krug's library of 150 reserve wines and a skin-fermented Pinot noir wine which gives it its color and unique flavor. Krug Rosé spends at least five years in the House's cellars.[13] It is re-created on a yearly basis.

Krug Vintage is, according to the House, "not the selection of the best wines of a particular year, but rather the expression of that year according to Krug."[14] Composed only of wines from a single year, Krug Vintage sits in Krug's cellars for at least a decade before release. The 2000 vintage was born of the House's desire to create a vintage for the last year of the millennium.

In the early 1980s, Krug introduced Krug Collection, an extension of Krug Vintage, consisting of bottles that have been kept in the House's cellars in Reims for at least ten additional years to allow the development of second-life aromas and flavours. The current offering is Krug Collection 1989. It is the first vintage from the trilogy of 1988, 1989 and 1990 to be released as part of Krug Collection, preceding 1988 upon the House's decision.[15]

Krug Clos du Mesnil comes from a single plot (known as a clos in French) of Chardonnay: a 1.84-hectare vineyard protected by walls since 1698 in the centre of Mesnil-sur-Oger, a village in the Champagne region of France. It comes from a single year and is kept in Krug's cellars for over a decade.[16]

Krug Clos d'Ambonnay also comes from a single year, and its grapes from a single 0.68-hectare walled plot of Pinot noir in the heart of Ambonnay, another village in France's Champagne region that plays a key role in Champagne making. Bottles are aged for over twelve years in Krug's cellars and are rare due to the small size of the vineyard.[17]

Krug Grande Cuvée
Krug Rosé
Krug Vintage 2000, Krug Vintage 2003 and Krug Vintage 2004
Krug Collection 1989
Krug Clos du Mesnil 2000 and Krug Clos du Mesnil 2003
Krug Clos d'Ambonnay 1998 and Krug Clos d'Ambonnay 2000

Winemaking

Krug utilizes all three Champagne varieties in their wines, Chardonnay, Pinot noir, and Pinot Meunier. For their two single vineyard vintages, Krug Clos du Mesnil is made in the Blanc de blancs style, completely from Chardonnay, while Krug Clos d'Ambonnay is made exclusively from Pinot noir.

The winemaking process at Krug begins with the individual selection of each plot of vines and continues with the initial vinification of the grapes from each plot in wooden casks, which – unlike tanks – are small enough to give the House the flexibility to hold a single plot's wine and therefore avoid pre-mature blending. In the event that a plot's wine is not up to the required level, it will leave the house as a bulk, never again to be labelled a Krug base wine.

Pressing and initial fermentation

Immediately following the harvest, the grapes are pressed close to Krug's plots, with this first grape juice kept for 24 hours in a vat in preparation for the fermentation stage.

The pressing from each plot is vinified separately. A pressing contains 4,000 kg of grapes and yields 20.5 hectolitres of first juice (the "cuvée"), which is poured into twelve oak casks chosen at random. Once fermentation is complete, the eleventh and twelfth casks are used to top up the other ten casks to protect the new wines from oxidation. For fifteen days, each cask is topped up with wine from the same plot.

Krug uses small 205-litre oak casks tailor-made from trees that are more than two centuries old in the forests of Hautes Futaies in Central France. Krug never use these casks immediately; during the first two or three years, they receive only second and third grape juices, with the goal of "tanning" the casks through the fermentation process, ridding them naturally of their woody aromas, making them well-seasoned and organoleptically inert. The average age of Krug oak casks is 20 years. They are retired after approximately 40 years of use.

During the summer preceding the harvest, casks are regularly watered to humidify the wood, a process Krug deems essential as its wines are not wood-aged and its casks are therefore empty for eight to nine months of the year.

The wines remain in the casks for several weeks.[18] During this period, clarification occurs naturally from the cool temperature of the cellar given the coming winter, as does a micro-oxygenation process from the use of natural containers, making the wine more resistant to oxygen over time. Finally, between December and January, the wine is drawn off into small stainless-steel vats.[19] From here, depending on the decisions of Krug's tasting committee, the wines will either contribute to that year's assemblage or be stored in steel vats in the House's library of 150 reserve wines to be used in the blend of a future Krug Grande Cuvée and Krug Rosé.

Tasting committee and assemblage

Over a period of five months in autumn and winter, the base wines and the reserve wines are tasted by the members of the tasting committee,[20] composed of five permanent members (Olivier Krug, representing the sixth generation of the Krug family; Eric Lebel, Krug cellar master and winemaker; Julie Cavil and Raphaele Leon-Grillon, who make up the Krug winemaking team; and Laurent Halbin, head of winemaking operations) and two members present according to their availability (Rémi and Maggie Henriquez, President and CEO of Krug).

At each session, between 15 and 18 samples are blind tasted, commented on and scored. During the tasting period, wine from each plot is carefully referenced, tasted at least two or three times and given a mark out of 20. By the end of December, the tasting committee establishes what Krug calls a "character sketch" of the year and begins tasting the 150 reserve wines from which it will draw the missing elements needed to re-create the character of Krug Grande Cuvée year after year.

In the spring, a second tasting session of wines from the year reveals how the wines have evolved over the winter period. Eric Lebel then proposes up to three blends for the Champagnes of that year, with each member of the committee having one vote. Once the blend has been decided, the House prepares for bottling which takes place once a year between April and May.[21]

Cellars

All Krug Champagnes are bottled during a single session, thirty weeks after the harvest. Once bottled, they are kept in the House's cellars in Reims. Krug characterizes this final stage of its winemaking process by very extended aging on the lees. Indeed, Krug's main champagne, Krug Grande Cuvée stays in the cellars for at least six years, Krug Rosé for five years, and Krug Vintage, Krug Clos du Mesnil and Krug Clos d'Ambonnay for at least ten years.

Vineyards

The House owns 30% of the vineyards that produce its wines[22] – a relatively high percentage in Champagne-making – with 20 hectares of vines in Ambonnay, Aÿ, Le Mesnil and Trépail.[23] It obtains the rest of its grapes from long-term contract growers for a total of 250 plots selected from the 270,000 listed in France's Champagne region.[24] Seventy to one hundred winegrowers currently work with Krug, providing 65% to 70% of the company's grapes.[25] Additionally, because Krug preserves the individual character of each wine, vinegrowers are able to taste each of the wines selected from their plots and follow their evolution over time in the event that their wines are selected as Krug reserve wines.[26]

Clos du Mesnil

In 1971, Rémi and Henri Krug purchased six hectares of vines around the renowned Chardonnay village of Mesnil-sur-Oger. Upon their initial visit, they discovered that their purchase included a walled vineyard of a mere 1.85 acres located in the heart of the village and bearing an inscription: "In the year 1698, this wall was built by Claude Jannin and Pierre Dehée Metoen and in the same year the vines were planted by Gaspard Jannin, son of Claude."

Krug stresses that the wall and unusual location in the center of the village create a micro-climate that accords a unique character to its grapes. It was for this reason that the House was inspired to devote a Champagne to a single plot for the first time in its history, resulting in Krug Clos du Mesnil 1979, presented in 1986.[27]

Clos d'Ambonnay

Following Krug Clos du Mesnil, Rémi and Henri Krug turned their attention to Pinot noir grapes, in particular those from Ambonnay, a grand cru known for its Pinot noir that had been a main source of supply for Krug since its founding. In 1991, after seven years of searching, they found a walled plot of just 0.68 hectares on the edge the village, on the south-eastern slope of the Montagne de Reims. Like the Clos du Mesnil, the plot was also surrounded by protective walls, which date back to the year 1766, although in this case the vineyard itself was not planted until the 20th century. Krug purchased the land in 1994 and released its first vintage – Krug Clos d'Ambonnay 1995 – in 2007.[27][28][29]

foundation	1843
founder	Johann-Joseph Krug
location	Reims, France
products	Champagne
owner	LVMH
homepage	krug.com/

Champagne Krug

History

Champagnes

Winemaking

Pressing and initial fermentation

Tasting committee and assemblage

Cellars

Vineyards

Clos du Mesnil

Clos d'Ambonnay

Marketing

Krug Lovers

Krug ID

Burning Man controversy

See also

Further reading

External links

References