Wine of the Year #2: Ian's Pick
2019 Adrien Dhondt Champagne Le Mesnil Sur Oger Les Coullemets

For over five years, I've been following the champagnes of Adrien Dhondt very closely.

When I first tasted his champagnes, there was obvious promise. At this point, I can say his wines are nearly uniformly brilliant.

As a collection, they are some of the most impressive champagnes I've tasted this year. With that said, Dhondt's 2019 Le Mesnil Sur Oger Les Coullemets was simply a stand out in relation to anything that I tasted this year.

It was an easy decision to name the 2019 Le Mesnil Sur Oger Les Coullemets as my Wine of the Year. What was marked more difficult was securing enough of the wine for an offer. There's very little of this wine made. To drive this point home, I should mention that there is only one other listing for Les Coullemets in the country. 

The story begins in the mid-80s when Adrien Dhondt's parents decided to stop selling grapes and make their own Champagnes from prime holdings in the Côte des Blancs. The history of Dhondt-Grellet then took a dramatic turn in 2012 when 22-year-old Adrien Dhondt took the winemaking helm. 

Dhondt's signature is a mineral-laden sculpted style that's deep and seriously vinous. Starting in the 2018 vintage, Adrien Dhondt founded his own label that pushes these stylistic tendencies even further. Dhondt's inaugural 2018 releases from Avize, Mesnil, and Oger were mind-bendingly good. Like 2019, the 2018 Les Coullemets was the star. I recently gifted a long-time colleague a bottle of it knowing that it would amaze. 

In 2019, Adrien Dhondt's are simply more of everything. The vintage is one of the best of the decade. If I had to bet on a vintage of the 2010s for top standing when the dust settles, it would be 2019. It's a remarkably complete vintage - powerful, tightly coiled, and clear. 

For this vintage, Dhondt chose to bottle three champagnes from the top, middle, and bottom sections of Mesnil. The village of Mesnil produces absolutely magical Chardonnay, and Dhondt's super-sensitive winemaking exploits all of its subtle terroir distinctions with picture-perfect clarity. 

Les Coullemets comes from the lower section of the Mesnil hill. William Kelley notes in his glowing review of the 2019 (see below) that in this part "the soils are shallower and the wines more mineral."

The 2019 is an emphatically mineral wine. However, that's only part of the wine's presentation. There's a distinctive chalky core and a super-refined and precise kinetic energy. Les Coullemets also possesses incredible breadth and internal architecture.  It all adds up to an incredibly compelling and singular champagne. The best frame of reference that I can think of is the raciness of Krug's Clos du Mesnil and the multifaceted complexity of Selosse's Carelles. 

Each November or December, I've gotten in the habit of reflecting on the wines that I tasted over the year. For better or worse, many are forgotten. A very small amount grip my memory. Dhondt's 2019 Les Coullemets resonated with me like very few wines that I have tasted. Adrien Dhondt simply nailed it. 

To order, email offers@crushwineco.com or call the store at (212) 980-9463.

Ian McFadden
Director, Fine & Rare
Crush Wine & Spirits

William Kelley, The Wine Advocate: "The 2019 Extra-Brut Blanc de Blancs Mesnil sur Oger Les Coullemets is brilliant, delivering a complex bouquet of peach, white flowers, hazelnuts and a subtle top note of acacia honey, followed by a full-bodied, satiny and layered palate that's both the most concentrated and the most tensile of these three lieu-dit bottlings. Les Coullemets is situated at the bottom of the slope, where the soils are shallower and the wines more mineral."