Extra Brut (0-6 g/L)
Disgorgement leaves a void in the bottle that must now be filled. Dosage (a mixture of pure cane sugar and old Champagne wine) is normally added at this stage to balance the naturally high acidity of the wine. The amount of dosage or liqueur d’expédition added determines how sweet the finished wine will be, whether ’Extra-Brut’, ’Brut Nature’, ’Brut’, ’Extra-Dry’, ’Sec’, ’Demi-Sec’ or ’Doux’.
The dosing liquor is prepared several months in advance using reserve wines at least two years old, which are carefully filtered to eliminate any yeasts or bacteria that might trigger an unintended fermentation. Adding sugar is the means to create the different categories of Champagne, which are classified as defined by EU regulations, in ascending order of sweetness as follows:
- Extra-Brut: 0-6 grams of sugar per litre
- Brut Nature: less than 3 grams of sugar per litre
- Brut: less than 12 grams of sugar per litre
- Extra-Dry: 12-17 grams of sugar per litre
- Sec: 17-32 grams of sugar per litre
- Demi-Sec: 32-50 grams of sugar per litre
- Doux: more than 50 grams of sugar per litre
Certain wines contain no dosage at all. In which case, the void created by disgorgement is filled by wine identical to the wine in the bottle. Such wines may be called ‘Zero Dosage’, or ‘Brut 100% (or ‘Brut Intégral’ or ‘Brut Sauvage’) etc.
