It's not the ten years on lees – the 2005 rosé had 11 years – or the 2mm smaller diameter bottle neck "to tighten the ageing" that chef de caves Cyril Brun calls a mini revolution, it's the dosage of the Rosé Millésimé 2008. At 7g/l, it's the lowest ever at Charles Heidsieck, lower even than for the 2008 white. Is the Champagne house that has never been afraid of dosage finally bowing to the fashion for low-dosage? Apparently not. Explaining how he made the choice, Cyril Bru

If Louis Roederer Cristal 2008 was "the Cristal of Cristals", in the memorable words of chef de cave Jean-Baptiste Lecaillon at the launch of the first two Vinothèque vintages in 2018, what does that make the 2013 he is now introducing? "2008-plus". A little later he describes it as "the Cristal of Cristalsss" and "50 per cent chalk, 50 per cent sunshine", whereas 2012, he says, was a little more on the sunshine side and 2008 was more on the soil [chalk] side. The 2013 is cer

With the 2007 vintage the disgorgement date has returned to the front label If I'm ever asked who from history I would choose as my guests for a fictional dinner party, Lily Bollinger would be one of them – not just because I hope she would bring some Bollinger to drink but because she sounds as if she was fun. Formidable, too, perhaps, judging by her business acumen, but fun all the same. It's not just the too often quoted (and here we go again): "I drink Champagne when I'm

I hardly need say that the past year isn't going to go down in history as very celebratory and that 2021 is looking shaky, but I don't need a celebration to drink Champagne (do you?). If I did, there are the first covid-19 vaccinations (my mother was one of the first to get one). And there's Christmas. And New Year. Here then are my Champagne picks: not as many as usual, and fewer at the bottom end thanks to the absence of tastings and travel, but there are some crackers and

New generation, sustainable, reusable, ice-bucket resistant, bottle-hugging paper case instead of the usual gift box for Ruinart Champagne Forget whether you like the look of it for a moment. Instead, consider the planet. Ruinart's 'second-skin eco case' is nine times lighter than the current gift box, its carbon footprint is 60% less than its predecessor's, it's 100% recyclable and uses no plastic. It also gives complete protection against the damaging effects of light on Ch

Another summer, another round-up of delicious dry rosés, plus a featherweight, lightly sparkling sweet wine from Italy and a pink Champagne that I wasn't familiar with and which hugely impressed me recently. There are lots of different styles, shades, flavours and grape varieties, but it has turned out to be an almost all-European selection this year, reflecting the limitations the pandemic has imposed on tastings, travel and trade. The one exception (perhaps ironically) is f

The 2012 vintage in Champagne was expected to be a disaster – as bad as 1984, and that's saying something. There was winter frost, spring frost, torrential downpours, a poor flowering, hail and cool, cloudy summer days. Inevitably, growers battled against mildew and the threat of botrytis. Then in mid-August the skies cleared, the sun came out, temperatures rose and it stayed like that with scarcely a break until the harvest in mid-September – late by today's standards. By th

I was going to call this A Taste of Dom Pérignon Rosé 2006 and Moët Grand Vintage Collection 2002 but, reader, I drank them, not by myself and not all at once, but these were not samples I tasted and then passed on to neighbours/friends/family. You wouldn't have done either. They were sent for Moët Hennessy's inspired 'Hidden Gems' Zoom tasting of five Champagnes: Veuve Clicquot Grande Dame 2008, Dom Ruinart Blanc de Blancs 2007, Krug Rosé 24ème édition and the two above. The

Caroline Fiot at Ruinart HQ in Reims, one of Ruinart's team of three winemakers The text of this article was first published in The World of Fine Wine issue 63 It was Caroline Fiot, one of Champagne’s brightest young winemakers, who was dispatched to London recently to introduce the latest release of Dom Ruinart Blanc de Blancs alongside its predecessor: thus 2007, the 25th vintage since the debut 1959, and 2006. Neither year is regarded as anywhere near a five-star vintage f

Writing my annual Festive Champagne Guide is, as you can imagine, no hardship, not least because I have tasted everything in it recently. As always it has been difficult to whittle down the numbers, but one way is to exclude most of the Champagnes recommended in last year's guide (however painful some exclusions are) and those featured in my blogs on Drappier and Bruno Paillard. Even whittled down, there's a spectrum of styles, ages, producers and retailers, presented in asce

Encrusted sea-aged Grande Sendrée 2008 and a pristine bottle conventionally matured in Drappier's Champagne cellars in the Aube Why age Champagne in the sea? It became clear when Michel Drappier held the first tasting to compare three of his Champagnes aged off the coast of Brittany with the same three cuvées aged in Drappier's cellars in Champagne. Looking over Champagne Drappier’s record of innovation since it re-introduced Pinot Noir to the Aube in the 1930s and in particu

£34/£27, Tanners Wines I wasn't planning to do Champagne this week, but now is the time to stock up on this Joseph Perrier. The current tempting offer price of £27 when you buy two or more ends in 10 days' time on 28 October. I hadn't tasted Cuvée Royale for a while and was hugely impressed. It's vivacious and elegant yet generous, too, and beautifully balanced, with a floral note on the nose and lemon curd and toast on the palate. It's a more or less equal blend of the three

D : Z is one of two new launches for Champagne Bruno Paillard. The other is the 2009 Assemblage, a vintage that Alice Paillard admits isn't an obvious choice for a house that has built its reputation on elegance in an uncompromisingly dry style. Making a non-dosage Champagne, i.e. without sugar added after disgorgement, is never easy. In fact, decades ago Bruno Paillard – the only man, incidentally, who has a Champagne house in his own name because he created it – experimente

We're there: my Champagne picks for Christmas, New Year and every other kind of festivity, whittled down with difficulty to what I hope is a manageable number, but I'm posting this before The Wine Gang's annual Ultimate Champagne Evening, so I may well add one or more top-end bottles next week. I've largely steered away from Champagnes featured in the last two years' round-ups, which means missing out some with particular regret, but it spans the spectrum of styles, producers

The tasting of the first two vintages, 1995 and 1996, of Roederer's ultrarare Cristal Vinothèque When Louis Roederer released the first vintage of Cristal Vinothèque in September last year, the 1995, there was a launch for the press in France, but no tasting in the UK. When you know that the entire UK allocation is 48 bottles of the white (out of a grand total of 400) and 18 bottles of the rosé, you can see why. On Tuesday, for the launch of the 1996 (500 bottles of white pro

Caroline Fiot in the garden of Champagne Ruinart, where she is a winemaker Oddly, until last week I had never visited Ruinart in Reims. It’s not as well known as its three main stablemates in the Moët Hennessy group (Moët et Chandon, Veuve Clicquot and Krug), nor one of the best known of the big names generally, but it is the oldest Champagne house (founded by Nicolas Ruinart in 1729) and I’ve always had a soft-spot for the impeccable fruit and purity of its Chardonnay-led st

No one could accuse Champagne Charles Heidsieck of rushing things or releasing vintages too frequently, not so far anyway. The new vintage of its top cuvée, Blanc des Millénaires, was unveiled in London three weeks ago: the 2004 is only the fifth in the 35 years since the debut 1983 Blanc des Millénaires ousted the previous cuvée, Champagne Charlie, in 1993 and it follows the magnificent 1995 which has been on the market for a decade. There's been no vintage of Millénaires re

So here they are: my Champagne picks for Christmas, New Year and every other kind of festivity, whittled down with difficulty to what I hope is a reasonable number. There's a spread of styles, producers and prices, kicking off below £20 and finishing around £150. I've largely steered clear of Champagnes featured in the last two years' round-ups, which means missing out some with particular regret. This year there's only one pink but, as it happens, without planning it, there

Olivier Krug was in town last week for the launch of the 2004 vintage Krug. Unsurprisingly, there wasn’t a spare seat in the house – a gem of a Georgian house in edgy Whitechapel, as it happens. Olivier charms everyone and a Krug tasting isn’t something you miss without a very good reason (death throes, exile, that sort of thing). I must say I do find that a Krug tasting at 10.30 in the morning puts a shine on the rest of the day. The rest of the week, in fact. The tasting tu

In homage to Growers’ Champagne Month (June, in case you didn’t know), I’ve listed below some of the top names and am highlighting two that are new to me this year. The first is Champagne Guy Charlemagne, winemaker-owners from father to son since 1892, based in Le Mesnil-sur-Oger. The second is Champagne Labruyère in Verzenay, which is not only new to me but new to the world. A quick word on growers’ Champagne. The term simply means a Champagne that is produced by the person/