Why it matters
The producer
Champagne Dosnon began with Davy Dosnon, who studied viticulture in Dijon and worked in Burgundy wine houses before returning to Lingey. His Champagne is made in the Côte des Bar, a southern part of the Champagne region, with Chardonnay and Pinot Noir at the centre of the range and Meunier appearing in the rosé. Former Puligny-Montrachet barrels are part of the house's working vocabulary, but the bottles remain wines of Avirey-Lingey, shaped by local fruit, limestone and long cellar ageing.
Dosnon owns two hectares and rents the remainder of the vineyards used by the house. That land base supports a range built around separate grape expressions and blends, allowing the red grape, the white grape and their combinations to be read in different bottles.
Place and vineyards
Where the wines begin
Avirey-Lingey lies in the Côte des Bar, where Champagne's appellation meets the Aube's warmer southern setting. The place matters on the label because Côte des Bar identifies the southern source of the grapes within Champagne, while the bottle style still depends on whether Chardonnay, Pinot Noir or Meunier carries the wine.
Pinot Noir supplies much of the range's breadth, while Chardonnay brings a firmer mineral and linear register in Récolte Blanche. The Côte des Bar setting lets Dosnon work with both qualities, keeping acidity present while allowing the wines to carry ripe fruit and a broader palate.
In the cellar
Vineyards and cellar
Hand harvesting controls the movement of fruit from vine to press, and Récolte Blanche is manually pressed before fermentation. Dosnon ferments its wines in Burgundian wooden barrels of 228, 500 or 600 litres, mainly former Puligny-Montrachet barrels. The barrels are at least five years old, so they provide space for fermentation and maturation without adding tannin or an overt wood taste.
Cellar time begins at 20 months and can extend to 10 years, depending on the vintage. That span allows the wines to leave the cellar with different levels of bottle development. Dosage stays very low, usually around 5 grams or absent, so the finish remains dry and the palate is shaped by fruit, acidity, limestone and ageing.
Wines to know
The range in view
Récolte Blanche is a Blanc de Blancs made from 100 percent Chardonnay from vines around 25 years old. It uses 20 percent new oak and 80 percent used Puligny-Montrachet barrels, ages for more than two years, and receives about 5 grams of dosage. Its known profile is mineral and linear.
Récolte Noire is 100 percent Pinot Noir, fermented in oak and aged for at least two years in bottle, with dosage around 5 grams. It isolates the house's red grape in a single variety wine. Récolte Brute takes Pinot Noir into a blend, with 70 percent Pinot Noir and 30 percent Chardonnay from Kimmeridgian soils. It is muscular, receives 5 grams of dosage, and ages for at least three years before disgorgement.
A useful way in
A bottle to begin with
Récolte Blanche is the first bottle to open. It is 100 percent Chardonnay from vines around 25 years old, hand harvested, manually pressed and fermented in a defined mix of new and used oak. More than two years of ageing and around 5 grams of dosage leave the wine dry, mineral and linear, with the limestone setting clear beneath the fruit. It brings together Dosnon's Côte des Bar address, its Burgundy-influenced cellar work and its preference for a clean finish in one glass.