To unlock the secret, Geoffrey Orban, a leading terroir expert in Champagne, offers his informed opinion.
To understand what minerality means in a wine, one must first understand what the soil is. For Geoffrey Orban, it is "not just where the vine is anchored, but also where it nourishes itself."
The plant will draw all the resources necessary for its development from it through root exchange. "The soil is alive!" he emphasizes. On the soil surface, fungi and epigeic fauna (collembolans, mites, worms) form humus. Deeper down, the vine's roots excrete acids, attacking rock and pebbles and forming clay. Earthworms connect the two, bringing clay upwards and mixing it with humus in their gut. This creates a clay-humus complex, soil that will supply the plant with cations such as Ca2+, Mg2+, Na+, and K+.
These mineral elements will be involved as cofactors in enzymatic reactions that enable the plant to grow. "Photosynthesis would not exist without magnesium," emphasizes Geoffrey Orban, giving a simple but fundamental example from the plant kingdom.
But let's return to what interests us, namely the organoleptic aspect of things. For, of course, it is the same types of biochemical reactions that produce the aromatic precursors of must and later of wine. When the vine synthesizes these, it is not to make a good wine, but, for example, to serve as an attraction for pollination. The tannin structure of a wine, its polyphenol richness, is also not created from the outset to produce a powerful red wine; rather, the color is primarily there to attract mammals that eat grapes and, as a result, spread seeds, an obligatory act in the life cycle. All of this is due to molecules synthesized thanks to the mineral elements extracted from the soil!
The geology of the location therefore has a paramount influence on the development of the vine and the wine. Without touching the actual nature of the soil, the winemaker's work can alter the concentration of mineral salts by adding soil amendments or plowing the earth. "The vine needs a healthy, regular, and as direct as possible sap pathway so that the mineral salts it transports can give it strength and a perfect constitution."
The acidity and the way it is organized in the wine is therefore a carrier of minerality.
During bottle aging in general and aging on laths in particular, these mineral elements organize themselves and then rearrange over time with the molecules responsible for texture and aromas.
The variability of the terroir also entails a variability of minerals in the soil. The terroir will therefore imprint the wine with its mineral fingerprint. Geoffrey Orban also describes that when tasting wine, "one can recognize the type of soil by the feeling it leaves in the mouth, identical to the tactile sensation when kneading rocks or earth between the fingers."
Tactile sensory effects
The feeling of the wine in the mouth, reminiscent of the texture of rock.
Chalk from the Côte des Blancs, Coteaux Vitryats, Montagne de Reims: Smooth onset on the palate, leaving a fine sedimentation on the tongue. The wine lingers on the back of the mouth on the finish.
A typical Champagne from the Côte des Blancs: Fleuron - Grand Cru - Ch. de la Renaissance
Sand from the Massif de St-Thierry, the right bank of the Marne Valley, the Vesle Valley: soft, fluid onset, low volume that fades at the end of the mouth. Activates abundant saliva by lingering in the back of the mouth.
A typical Champagne from the Massif St Thierry: Carte Blanche - Ch. Maxime Blin
Clay from the Ardre Valley, the Marne Valley, Bar-sur-Aube: Rich onset, the wine quickly rises to the top of the palate, spherical sensation in the middle of the mouth. Gourmand. Full-bodied.
A typical Champagne from the Marne Valley: Grande Réserve - Ch. Dehours
A typical Champagne from Bar sur Aube: Carte d'Or - Ch. Drappier
Limestone from the Tardenois, the Vesle Valley: Smooth onset, the wine quickly moves to the finish, where it lingers. Beautiful persistence, tactile remanence of the wine in the aftertaste.
A typical Champagne from the Ardre Valley: L'Inattendue - Domaine Lagille Champagne
Marl around Bar-sur-Seine: Marl is the combination of clay and limestone. Rich onset and great breadth of the wine. Very great vigor. Full, powerful wine.
A typical Champagne from Bar sur Seine: Signature Extra Brut -Ch. Huguenot-Tassin
Olfactory sensory effects.
The rock is placed in water and tasted.
Chalk: moist, stony, powdery, milky, licorice.
Sand: iodized, sea water, algae, spray.
Clay: undergrowth, humus.
Limestone: calcareous water, licorice, pebble.
Marl: scraped pebble, empyreumatic, smoky.
While soil cultivation was forgotten for a time, it is now very popular again. It restores a distinct identity to the vines and then to the wine, which, with appropriate, careful, and selective research, can improve the quality of each individual plot and potentially produce plot-specific Champagnes of truly exceptional character, highly valued by lovers of rare wines.
Source: La Marne Viticole - Jan 2016
(c) Photo by Champagne Charpentier
