Robert Moncuit

Grower Champagne from Le Mesnil-sur-Oger, Grand Cru of the Côte des Blancs. The family's vineyards go back to 1889 when Alex Moncuit planted the first parcels; Robert first bottled under the family name in 1928, breaking with the era's dominant négociant-supply model. The current generation is Pierre Amillet (Françoise Moncuit's son), who has run the estate since 2000.

Around 10 hectares - 8 in Le Mesnil-sur-Oger and 2 in Oger - all Grand Cru, 100% Chardonnay - worked without herbicides or pesticides, hand-harvested, each parcel pressed and vinified separately. Malolactic is standard except in the warmer vintages. No chaptalisation, no filtration. The house style has always been Extra Brut; from base-vintage 2019 onward every cuvée is zero dosage.

The range is straight Blanc de Blancs: Les Grands Blancs (Extra Brut NV, the volume wine), the Réserve Perpétuelle (a solera-style BdB Extra Brut NV), a Millésime vintage, and three single-parcel wines - Les Chétillons from a two-hectare set of parcels on the south-east slope of Le Mesnil (first vintage 2008, skipped 2009-2011, 350L oak, indigenous yeasts, five-plus years on lees), Les Vozémieux from Oger, and Clos des Auges. Around 60,000 bottles a year - small, Grand Cru-only, precise, and positioned in the serious mid-tier of Côte des Blancs growers without the Selosse or Péters premium.

Worth separating from Champagne Pierre Moncuit, a different house in the same village from the same 1889 family root - around 20 hectares split between Le Mesnil-sur-Oger and the Sézanne, run by the siblings Nicole and Yves Moncuit with Yves's daughter Valérie. Its old-vine Le Mesnil cuvée is labelled Cuvée Nicole Vieilles Vignes, from a separate set of Les Chétillons parcels.