Charles Dufour & Françoise Martinot 'Bistrotage' B.20 Champagne 750ml

Champagne's 2020 picking began on 17 August, the earliest on record; Charles Dufour cropped his mother's Chervey Pinot Noir at 35 hl/ha and raised it for nearly four years.

B.20 is drawn entirely from the 2020 harvest in Chervey, the Françoise Martinot family parcels in the Vallée de l'Arce. Nouvelles Sélections, the Japanese importer, gives the plot facts: Pinot Noir only, clay-limestone and Kimmeridgian soils, vines averaging 35 years, and a yield of 35 hl/ha, five hectolitres under what the same vines gave for B.19. The year explains the number. The Union des Maisons de Champagne recorded the wettest February on record, heat and drought from mid-March, the driest July ever measured, and berries lighter than average when picking started on 17 August. Des Racines au Verre, a French retailer, calls the base wine the reflection of a sun-filled year.

In the cellar the importer lists half the must in stainless steel and half in 228-litre Burgundy barrels, twelve months on the lees, and zero dosage. Sager + Wine, the UK importer, adds that the whole bunches fermented spontaneously, that malolactic took place in cask and tank, and that B.20 assembles three separate lots of Pinot Noir from Chervey. The dated record: tirage on 4 November 2021, disgorgement on 16 June 2025, which Des Racines au Verre totals as nearly four years of élevage, with total sulphur under 10 mg/l. Nouvelles Sélections quotes its usual line of more than five years in bottle, so the two accounts differ on length; we give both.

Françoise Martinot-Dufour heads this récoltant-manipulant, 3.5 hectares of Pinot Noir in Chervey and Neuville-sur-Seine certified by Ecocert since 2010; Lebendigeweine credits her with driving that conversion. Her son Charles, who took over the Dufour estate in 2004, farms the vines and makes the wine, and the bottler address is his: 4 rue de la Croix-Malot, Landreville.

In the glass

The two trade notes we found read like two different wines. Lebendigeweine describes pale straw with a salmon-pink shimmer, dried meadow herbs, hay, thyme and lavender over roasted hazelnut, bread crust and red berry, then a vinous, linear, almost ascetically dry palate of taut acidity, rock dust and chalk. Des Racines au Verre finds toasted notes and white fruit, volume and generosity, a fine, lively bead, dried fruit, and a suave, velvety finish. Rue Pinard sits between: green apple, citrus zest, saline.

When to open

Des Racines au Verre serves it at 8–10 °C, needs no decanting, and gives a window of up to seven or eight years; Lebendigeweine prefers 6–8 °C. Disgorged June 2025, it is ready now.

At the table

Lebendigeweine suggests oysters, cured ham or 18-month Comté; Des Racines au Verre points to mushroom risotto or poultry.

Quick facts

Provenance

Sourced from the Japanese importer.

Sources: Nouvelles Sélections (Japanese importer); Sager + Wine (UK importer); Des Racines au Verre; Lebendigeweine; Rue Pinard; Union des Maisons de Champagne 2020 harvest release