Our final full day was destined to be action packed with two visits, lunch and dinner.
The first destination was the famous Avenue de Champagne in Epernay. Here we found the who’s who of Champagne Houses in possibly the most valuable piece of real estate in the world when you consider the stocks of wine lying down in the cellars.
We chose Boizel to visit, partly because I am a fan of their Champagnes but also because they are a relatively small producer and do an excellent visit.
With the groups split into two – Margarite hosted one and Staf hosted the other and I darted between the two. Despite being part of the Lanson group, the Boizel family are still heavily involved in the wine blending and production and are looking to innovate with single vineyard ‘monocru’ to really express an individual terroir. Finishing off with a tasting of a couple of wines, we extended the visit while basking in the glorious sunshine by exploring two more wines in their range.
We walked to the Grillade Gourmande restaurant in Epernay and basked again in their outdoor garden and tucked into superb sea bass, grilled pork and pear in red wine – again washed down with magnums of Champagne and Bouzy Rouge.
It was just a fifteen minute drive to Champagne Le Gallais – a family owned estate that was created in 1997. Charlotte Le Gallais runs the property and they produce about 35,000 bottles per year – very boutique!
We were hosted by Justine who took us on a lovely little walk through the cellar, into the vines and then towards the historic Boursault castle which was built by the actual Veuve (widow) Clicquot in 1843. The views were sensational as we were perched up a hill and gave us another perspective on Champagne.
The tasting was fun and relaxed as we enjoyed four of their wines – with the Meunier grape taking centre stage for the first time on the tour.
Arriving back at 6pm we had just an hour to turn ourselves round before heading out to the Jardin des Crayères restaurant situated in a big park. We sat outside and basked again in the evening warmth and tucked into a delightful tomato and burrata creation, beef cheek, cheese and dessert. Magnums of Alfred Gratien and Jacquart Champagne, a Cumières rouge and a Champagne Ratafia finished us all off!
This was a great tour, with great Champagnes, great food and great people.
