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Saignée de Sorbée is a thrilling, idiosyncratic, sappy, stemmy, peppery rosé that can be thought of as a delicious light red as much as a rosé Champagne. The Sorbée plot is a little plateau above the slope where Vouette sits and is almost pure Portlandian limestone—something very rare in Champagne. The site is almost flat, with a slight exposure towards the southwest. Gautherot harvests here in multiple passes, with only the smallest bunches and ripest fruit making it into his Saignée.
Sorbée is the vineyard that gives Bertrand the least amount of stress. The vines are between 32 and 50 years old and were planted with old mass-selection cuttings from Domaine Lafarge in Volnay. The soils have been cultivated since at least the 1860s, with no herbicides ever used. Gautherot feels that this made it easier to adapt this site to his biodynamic practices.
Uncrushed whole grapes macerate in an open-top wooden vat before pressing. Vinified entirely without sulphur, the wine ages for 10 months in 400-litre barrels before being disgorged without any dosage. It’s a vibrant, red-fruited, bunchy and light-bodied sparkling wine. It shows crushed wild strawberry, nettle and an earthy, complex lick that we assume comes from the no-sulphur aging.