Champagne Dumont Domaine de Mondeville '369 M' Brut NV

The Champagne house of the Dumont family is situated in Champignol-lez-Mondeville, a village in the southern Champagne region of the Aube, some 90 miles southeast of Reims and Epernay. Characterized by forested hills, streams and vineyards, it is a natural and reflective environment that has attracted people such as Saint Bernard (Clairvaux) and Renoir (Essoyes). The Dumonts have owned vineyards in this area for over two hundred years and in recent years, it has been Bernard Dumont who has set the direction of the family domain and its 15 hectares. In 2019, Bernard was joined by his nephew, Laurent, who spent a decade travelling the world and gaining wine producing experience, including some years working with Roederer on their bio-dynamic farming project. Laurent’s experience and enthusiasm for bio-dynamic farming dovetailed perfectly with Bernard’s move to organic farming and in 2021 the domain was certified both organic and bio-dynamic. In recognition of this progress, the Dumonts decided to rename the domain by adding the village name, Mondeville, and thus drawing attention to their terroir. The vineyards on the Mondeville hillsides reach as high as 396 meters giving the Dumont’s the distinction of having the highest elevation vineyards in Champagne. The soils are a geological extension of those in Chablis, namely kimmeridgian chalky clay. Bernard’s comments concerning the common terroir are amusing; “we grow grapes on the same soils as the vine growers in the Chablis region. There, they produce white wine from white grapes and here we produce white wine from red grapes.” The Dumont vineyard is planted with 90% Pinot Noir, (with nearly 50 different clones) 8% Chardonnay and 2% Arbanne. The winery has also refined its wine making; fermenting with indigenous yeasts in large foudres produced from oak trees harvested from their local forest and using little or no sulfur throughout the process.