Blanc de Noirs Champagne (Pinot Noir and/or Meunier)

Making white wine from black grapes is old practice in Champagne. The Champagne method was first set out in 1718 by Canon Godinot, presumed author of Manière de cultiver la vigne et de faire le vin de Champagne, who specified that these white wines were made with black grapes, adding: "Quand les raisins sont coupés, plus tôt ils sont pressurés, plus le vin est blanc" (the sooner the cut grapes are pressed, the whiter the wine). Gently pressing whole bunches to extract almost no colour from the skins was a speciality in the time of Dom Pérignon, in the 17th century. Bollinger dates the first vintage of its Vieilles Vignes Françaises to 1969, and Krug made the first Clos d'Ambonnay in 1995 after buying the walled vineyard in 1994, revealing the wine in 2007.

• Bollinger Managing Director Charles-Armand de Belenet, on the house website: "It is an authentic taste that Bollinger has enhanced since 1969, the first vintage of this cuvée."
• Rémi and Henri Krug found the Clos d'Ambonnay, walled since 1766, in 1991 after a seven-year search; they bought it in 1994 and made the first Clos d'Ambonnay in 1995, revealed in 2007
• Bollinger's two clos in Aÿ, Chaudes Terres and Clos Saint-Jacques, survived the phylloxera outbreak; historically 3 parcels resisted, and 2 remain today

Pinot Noir is the dominant grape in the Montagne de Reims and the Côte des Bar, and it thrives on cool, chalky soil. The Montagne de Reims surrounds Reims like a half-moon, and Pinot Noir is its most common variety. In the Côte des Bar, south-east of Troyes, Pinot Noir makes up 83% of the vines. In the Marne Valley, the area furthest east, near Épernay, is mainly planted with Pinot Noir, while Meunier becomes dominant further west; Meunier is compatible with soils that contain more clay, such as in the Marne Valley. Pinot Noir and Meunier, especially (but not only) from the Montagne de Reims, the Marne Valley and the Côte des Bar, yield a wide diversity of blanc de noirs styles. Champagne has a dual climate with continental and oceanic influences and an average annual temperature of 11°C; Reims lies at a latitude of 49°5 north and Épernay at 49°.

• Ambonnay, Aÿ, Bouzy, Verzenay and Mailly-Champagne are among the 17 communes whose wines may carry the grand cru mention under the INAO specification (2026 text)
• Chalk is highly porous and stores 300-400 litres of water per m3, and it draws in water through capillary action, which naturally regulates the vine's water consumption
• Mailly Grand Cru's vineyards extend over more than 70 hectares, located wholly in Mailly-Champagne, planted to 75% Pinot Noir and 25% Chardonnay
• Meunier is less susceptible to frost than the other two main varieties because its bud burst happens later

Blanc de Noirs may come from Pinot Noir, Meunier or both. Wines made with Pinot Noir tend to show distinctive aromas of red fruits and flowers (rose, violet), while Meunier produces supple, fruity wines with aromas of yellow fruits that tend to age more quickly than wines made from the other two main varieties. Even when a grape is black-skinned, its juice is white, so colour depends on pressing: the whole clusters are pressed as carefully and gently as possible so as not to colour the juice through excessive contact time with the skins. The Comité Champagne classes Blanc de Noirs as vinous, a wine with a powerful body, in contrast to lighter, more aerial wines. Decanter (Chris Mercer, page last updated December 2025) writes that blanc de noirs sparkling wines tend to show more red fruit and a more solid structure and fuller mouthfeel than blanc de blancs, while vintage, vineyard location, harvest strategy, fermentation methods and lees ageing can vary the profile.

• Pinot Noir: distinctive aromas of red fruits and flowers such as rose and violet
• Meunier: supple, fruity wines with yellow-fruit aromas that tend to age more quickly; a Decanter profile (last updated February 2024) observed that single-varietal Meunier wines are now a fixture in independent Champagne
• Pressing is carried out in two stages, the cuvée (first pressing juice) and the taille (second), separately by grape variety and by growth
• In the Champagne method, a primary fermentation in tanks turns the must into wine, and a bottle fermentation, the prise de mousse, then makes the wine sparkling; the pressure inside a Champagne bottle is within the range of 5 to 6 bar
• After the second fermentation the bottles mature on their lees, the yeasts that have multiplied in the bottle; by the end of the second fermentation these yeasts die and decompose, a process known as autolysis. A steady cellar temperature of around 12°C is crucial for the best ageing conditions
• Decanter's blanc de noirs panel report (last updated December 2025) admitted Champagnes made from 100% red grapes: Pinot Noir and/or Meunier

Bollinger makes Vieilles Vignes Françaises from two Grand Cru clos of ungrafted Pinot Noir in Aÿ, Chaudes Terres and Clos Saint-Jacques. The land is worked by hand with the help of a draught horse, the vines are planted en foule by the layering method known as provignage, and the wine is a Blanc de Noirs aged in the cellar for at least five years. The 2014 vintage is 100% Grand Cru Pinot Noir fermented entirely in aged oak barrels, with a dosage of 4 grams per litre and 1865 numbered bottles. Krug Clos d'Ambonnay comes from a single plot of Pinot Noir: a walled plot of 0.68 hectare in Ambonnay. Also in Ambonnay, the grower Egly-Ouriet farms a 10-hectare estate consisting primarily of Pinot Noir, ferments its grand cru wines in barrel and makes a Blanc de Noirs Grand Cru. In Mailly-Champagne, Mailly Grand Cru, founded in 1929 by 24 local growers and describing itself as one of the oldest cooperatives in Champagne, makes a Blanc de Pinot Noir from named sites on predominantly north-facing slopes.

• Bollinger Vieilles Vignes Françaises: 100% Pinot Noir from 31 ares in two walled clos in Aÿ; first vintage 1969; the 2014 release was 1865 numbered bottles with a dosage of 4 g/L
• Krug Clos d'Ambonnay: Pinot Noir from a 0.68-hectare walled plot in Ambonnay, purchased 1994, first vintage 1995, revealed 2007
• Egly-Ouriet: a récoltant-manipulant (grower) with Pinot Noir in Ambonnay and parcels in Bouzy and Verzenay; its range includes a Blanc de Noirs Grand Cru
• Mailly Grand Cru Blanc de Pinot Noir: first-press wine, tank- and barrel-aged separately, with reserve wines aged in vats in a solera system

Under the INAO specification for Champagne AOC (2026 text), white Champagnes may come from a blend of white and black grapes, from white grapes only (blanc de blancs) or from black grapes only (blanc de noirs). A Champagne Blanc de Noirs is a wine made exclusively from dark-skinned grapes such as Pinot Noir and/or Meunier. The general ageing rules apply: release only after at least 15 months of maturation counted from tirage, and at least 36 months for vintage wines. In practice ageing is nearly always longer: 2-3 years for non-vintage wines and 4-10 years for vintage Champagne. The area under production was 34,200 hectares in 2025, across 319 villages in 5 départements: Marne, Aube, Aisne, Haute-Marne and Seine-et-Marne.

• Under the INAO specification (2026 text), a single grape variety may appear on a Champagne label only if all the grapes used for the base wines are of that variety, in characters no more than 3 millimetres in height or width and no more than half the size of the appellation name
• Under the same text, 17 communes, including Ambonnay, Aÿ, Bouzy and Verzenay, may use the grand cru mention, and 42 further communes may use the premier cru mention
• The Decree of 1 July 1952 reserved grand cru for municipalities rated 100% and premier cru for those rated 90 to 100%; the INAO scrapped the cru scale in 2010, but municipalities with those designations could retain them
• Champagne still harvests fully by hand because the legislation requires clusters to reach the pressing centre whole; the INAO text prohibits any harvesting method that does not pick whole bunches
• Under EU Regulation 2019/33 (Annex III Part A), the sugar terms on a sparkling wine label are: brut nature (also pas dosé or dosage zéro) under 3 g/L, only where no sugar has been added after the secondary fermentation; extra brut 0 to 6 g/L; brut under 12 g/L; extra dry 12 to 17 g/L; sec 17 to 32 g/L; demi-sec 32 to 50 g/L; doux over 50 g/L. The actual sugar content may not differ by more than 3 grams per litre from the label

The Comité Champagne suggests Blanc de Noirs for intimate occasions, such as a dinner with loved ones where a heart-warming family dish is served, and for great occasions such as Christmas Eve, when it enhances meat dishes, roasts and stews; its favourite pairing is crisp roast suckling pig. In Decanter's blanc de noirs panel report (last updated December 2025), Fiona Beckett named roast chicken, a richly creamy risotto with truffles and Vacherin Mont d'Or as matches for blanc de noirs. In the glass, Blanc de Noirs runs from lemon yellow to golden yellow, with profiles that include fruity, floral, spicy, vinous, full-bodied, structured and dense. Visitors to the region can see the Champagne Hillsides, Houses and Cellars, inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage list on 4 July 2015; the historic hillside vineyards in Mareuil-sur-Aÿ are one of the three ensembles chosen for the nomination.

• The three ensembles in the UNESCO nomination are the historic hillside vineyards in Mareuil-sur-Aÿ, Saint-Nicaise Hill in Reims and Avenue de Champagne in Épernay
• Mailly Grand Cru's growers began digging its cellars 19 metres underground in the winter of 1931-1932
• Krug recommends serving its Champagnes between 9°C and 12°C, and Bollinger recommends 10 to 12°C for Vieilles Vignes Françaises 2014
• In the Comité Champagne's vinous profile, "the wine’s character and substance prevail over its effervescence"

Primary sources (Comité Champagne, INAO, EU law, and the producers' own websites for their own cuvées): https://www.champagne.fr/en/champagne-tasting/choosing-your-champagne/blanc-de-noirs, https://www.champagne.fr/en/about-champagne/a-great-blended-wine/champagne-and-its-grape-varieties, https://www.champagne.fr/en/about-champagne/a-great-blended-wine/the-champagne-region, https://www.champagne.fr/en/about-champagne/the-champagne-terroir/champagne-and-its-soil, https://www.champagne.fr/en/about-champagne/the-champagne-terroir/champagne-and-its-climate, https://www.champagne.fr/en/about-champagne/how-champagne-is-made/pressing, https://www.champagne.fr/en/about-champagne/how-champagne-is-made/maturation, https://www.champagne.fr/en/champagne-frequently-asked-questions?nid=608, https://www.champagne.fr/en/visit-champagne/life-in-champagne/champagne-world-heritage, https://extranet.inao.gouv.fr/fichier/pno-CDC-Champagne-cn260618.pdf, https://www.champagne.fr/en/find-out-more/champagne-at-a-glance, https://www.champagne-bollinger.com/en/the-collection/vieilles-vignes-francaises, https://www.champagne-bollinger.com/en/wine/vieilles-vignes-francaises-2014, https://www.krug.com/en-int/champagne/krug-clos-dambonnay-1995, https://www.champagne-mailly.com/en/roots-grand-cru/, https://www.champagne-mailly.com/en/our-cuvees/blanc-de-pinot-noir/, https://www.champagne-mailly.com/en/human-adventure/, https://www.champagne.fr/en/champagne-frequently-asked-questions, https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:32019R0033. Secondary sources: https://www.decanter.com/learn/blanc-de-noirs-champagne-vs-blanc-de-blancs-44916/, https://www.decanter.com/premium/champagne-egly-ouriet-maestro-of-the-montagne-de-reims-522799/, https://www.decanter.com/premium/blanc-de-noirs-champagne-panel-tasting-results-572376/. The INAO Champagne text is the published national-opposition version of the specification. Last verified 2026-11-09