Blend: 80% Chardonnay, 20% Aligote
From: (Savigny-les-Beaune) Burgundy, France
Taste: Champagne quality for Crémant prices? Yes, yes indeed. This charming Crémant comes to you from old vines in Burgundy’s Côte de Beaune and Hautes-Côtes. Its cépage consists of 80% Chardonnay and 20% Aligote, and the lovely bubbly has spent 36 months aging before release (the bottles are even hand-riddled!). Golden, toasty, and fresh. Lemon citrus, floral notes, and yeasty biscuits meet a chiseled core and long, elevated finish with zingy acidity and precision. Fair warning: it goes down too quickly, but you won't regret it even for a second.
Pairing: Chicken karaage! Thankfully, there are new places around town that serve this delightful dish as take-out (and honestly, since we’re both lazy and always working, this is our favorite way to pair this wine), but if you prefer doing things the tried and true way of “DIY,” the recipe from the NY Times should do the trick. An excerpt from the recipe: “At Kunyan, a ramen shop in a mountain hot-spring town near the Sea of Japan, fried chicken is served until 2 am, or whenever the last customer leaves. The flesh is firm and flavorful with sweetened soy and garlic, coated in a fox-colored crust of potato starch that stays crisp on the table through a second round of highballs. Kunyan’s “mama,” who presides over pan-frying gyoza and pouring frothy Super Dry beer, would never give up her recipe, but the flavors in this version are awfully similar. To approximate the best Japanese chicken - meatier, fattier, and more flavorful than American supermarket meat - buy your chicken from a farmers’ market, and debone it yourself or ask a butcher. Don’t feel pressure to do it perfectly: The pieces will be encrusted in a crisp coating, and the leftover bones make great stock.” - Hannah Kirshner. A note for our vegetarian friends: This recipe may also be recreated with cauliflower or broccoli florets in place of chicken! And if you make either version, please swing by the shop to share some with us!
Karaage (Japanese Fried Chicken)
Recipe from Kunyan
Adapted by Hannah Kirshner
About. Champagne is the undisputed king of sparkling wine, and deservedly so. But if there is a Crown Prince, it is most assuredly Crémant de Bourgogne. The terroir in Burgundy is the most similar to Champagne, with emblematic Kimmeridgian limestone, and the two regions share the same two dominant grapes — Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. The market, moreover, endorses this hierarchy: Crémant de Bourgogne remains the highest-priced sparkling wine after champagne.
Parigot & Richard has been producing fine Crémant in Burgundy for five generations and remains one of the few domaines focusing exclusively on these wines. Located in Savigny-lès-Beaune, with vineyards in both the Côte de Nuits and the Côte de Beaune, Parigot is today directed by Grégory Georger, the current generation’s torchbearer. He adheres precisely in every respect to the traditional Méthode Champenoise, from hand-harvesting, pressing and fermentation, even hand-riddling.
This said, Crémant de Bourgogne is not champagne. It is though the same class of wine, albeit quite distinct. Crémant expresses the unique terroir of Burgundy, with all the elegance and seductive charm of its gorgeous Pinot Noir and Chardonnay (and in this case, Chardonnay and Aligoté).
Crémant de Bourgogne is arguably the most prestigious sparkling wine appellation outside of Champagne, and Parigot & Richard is one of its premier interpreters. “Sentinelle” is a blanc de blancs crafted from 80% Chardonnay and 20% Aligoté. Fruit comes from old vines in the Côte de Beaune and Hautes-Côtes, and, after the secondary fermentation is completed (in the bottle, of course), the wine rests for about 36 months on its lees (spent yeasts). The bottles are hand-riddled during that time, and the finished wine is given a four gram/liter dosage (qualifying it as “Extra Brut”).
