We recently had the great pleasure of hosting Sébastien Mouzon from Champagne Mouzon-Leroux for our first in-store tasting of the year. Sébastien is energetic and good-humored, and nothing if not extremely passionate about the life of his soils, the biodiversity in his vineyards - especially through his practice of large-scale agro-forestry -and the honest expression of the Verzy terroir through his farming and his wines.

When Sébastien Mouzon took the reigns at his 7 hectare family estate in Verzy, he decided to learn from the masters: Benoït Lahaye, and Vincent Laval. He converted to organic farming, and quickly expanded to biodynamic certification at the brisk clip of a young, passionate winemaker dedicated to making soulful, terroir-driven Champagnes. After spending time in Africa and learning about the concept of agro-forestry through coplanting trees and flowering bushes with other crops in order to encourage soil health and biodiversity, he fully embraced this approach and was the first vine-grower ever in Champagne (likely in France for that matter) to implement full-scale agro-forestry in his vineyards. He now has thousands of fruit trees and flowering bushes planted throughout his parcels. We asked him if we has considered crazy by his neighbors when he started tearing out vines to plant fruit trees in his plots, and he laughed and nodded. Apparently, they already thought he was crazy when he went organic (at the time in the early 2000s, it was extremely rare in Champagne)! He told us that his father would have torn out the trees if Sébastien planted them on a normal work day, so he went quietly on Sundays to do the work. By the time his father discovered trees throughout the vineyard, it was too late to rip them out or try to stop Sébastien! 

Having Sébastien at the shop provided a great opportunity to ask questions about his vision and intent with his wines. From discussing with him, it became very clear that his idea is to present wines that portray and represent the village of Verzy and the terroir of this particular spot. As seen on the map above, Verzy is located on slopes on the North-East side of the Montagne de Reims. Here, Sébastien explains, the chalk bedrock is on average about 2 meters below the top soil, which has some clay composition, providing enough richness for Pinot Noir to be well suited to the area. His wines are generally not parcel specific, as he wants them to provide a true picture of Verzy, not just one plot in Verzy. From what we could glean, he has somewhere between 60-80 tiny parcels in the area, and small amount of vines in the nearby village of Villers-Marmery that his grandfather planted to Pinot Noir - which is used for his "L'Angelique" Rosé. Wines are all barrel-fermented in large 10 year-old (on average) barrels. Fermentation is natural, with no SO2 applied during fermentation or aging. He is not afraid of or against the use of SO2, but only uses it if he senses problems arising in the wines, which he tastes at least once a month during aging. Since 2018, he has started to use his own yeasts, found in the winery and vineyards, for the second fermentation. He still often employs a percentage of classic Champagne yeast but has started to integrate different Mouzon-Leroux yeast strains that he hopes to fully rely on in the future. We might not have mentioned that the wines are fantastic! Mineral-driven, straight and focused, with depth and length, we have always been big fans of the Mouzon-Leroux wines, and they only seem to be getting better each year!

Today, we're offering the lineup of Champagnes that we tasted in the shop earlier this week, his entry level "introduction to Verzy" bottling, L'Atavique, the Blanc de Noirs and Blanc de Blancs bottlings, and his delicious and understated Rosé. 

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We're also taking the opportunity, while on the subject of Champagne, to offer special sale-pricing on the end of stock from Champagne André Beaufort. Located in Ambonnay, directly south of Verzy on the South-east slopes of the Montagne de Reims, with vineyards in Ambonnay and Polisy, the Beaufort estate has been championed by Chambers Street for many years.