Spec me Some Good Champagne

covenantuk said:
Anyone noticed the insane price increases at retail over the last year or two for Bollinger? I bought a case on offer at Tesco 2 years ago for £25 a bottle. It's currently retailing at £41 (occasionally on offer at £10 off which shows you how much markup is going on).

Although I drink top quality Cava as an every day bubbly (the missus is Spanish) and pick out better champagnes for really special occasions, I'm a big fan of Bollinger for normal birthdays/occasions etc as I've yet to find someone who doesn't like it.

For info, if you want to stock up on Bollinger, Costco sell it by the case at £29/bottle equivalent.
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Majestic also have it at £30 a bottle (when buying 6).

My haul for a friends birthday this weekend

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Nyetimber Classic Cuvee Brut 2008, a bargain at £22.99 a bottle. Plus a bottle of Balvenie, just need a bottle of Sipsmith gin and a few bottles of red and we shall be done.
 
xarr said:
Nyetimber Classic Cuvee Brut 2008, a bargain at £22.99 a bottle.
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Had a bottle of this on New Years Eve. Very nice although the Nyetimber I had at Pollen Street Social was considerably nicer (it was bought for me so I don't have any other details about it).
Going through my wine fridge yesterday, I came across 4 bottles of Champage that must have been given to me, but I can't remember when or why.

- Charles de Cazanove
- Berry Bros & Rudd
- Oudinot Epernay Brut 2005
- Cuvee Jean Louis Bredon (by Piper & Charles Heidsieck for Waitrose)

I'll be having one of these bottles this Saturday evening before a load of fantastic steak is cooked on the BBQ :D
 
25% off wine by the case this week if you buy 2 or more cases from tesco direct!

You can get their gold medal winning Premier Cru BRUT NV for <£12 a bottle ;)

Also I tried some pol roger NV a couple of weeks ago, really liked it, maybe more than verve.
 
LeSigNagE said:
I love to support the smaller growers. If you're looking for something that is both excellent quality and easy going, look at Gosset Grand 2000!

While on the topic of Champagne, I would love it if you could fill in a questionnaire about the topic for my dissertation... https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1J2robrKL8lvLLGLhjB6pacHyjcTSUGw2lJuYply_KbA/viewform?pli=1
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Hadn't spotted this earlier and it seems you've done a bit of a post and run anyway.

As an expansion to your survey (which i've just completed), one thing i'd add which didn't fall into your survey was how i find the options in your 3rd category (£51 to £100) to be pretty limited.

Beyond something like the Gosset i often find myself stuggling, on the occasions I want to treat myself to something around the £70-£80 mark. For me the brackets work like this

£0 to £20 – Supermarket own brands, Nicholas Feuillatte.
£21 - £50 – Moet, Vueve Cliquot, Taittinge, Bollinger, Ayala, Louiser Roderer, Perrier Jouet.
£50 - £100 – Gosset, some vintage expressions of the £21 - £50 range.
>£100 – Dom Perignon, Cristal, Krug.

Because i often like trying something new, the opportunities of something "unusual" around the £80 is limited. If anyone has any suggestions though i'd be open to hear them :)
 
Just bumping this as it seemed to have become a general Champagne thread (albeit not used in over a year)

I've recently been enjoying a couple of Blanc de Blancs.

First up

Gosset Blanc de Blancs - ~£60

http://www.champagnedirect.co.uk/pd_gosset_grand_blanc_de_blancs.cfm

This is probably the best champagne i've ever tasted. Only recently released i believe but it is absolutely unreal. Fantastic, delicate and crisp.

Then (whilst) not champagne i had a bottle of

Nyetimber 2003 Blanc de Blancs - £40

http://www.majestic.co.uk/Nyetimber-Blanc-de-Blancs-zid23003

Great price for a very decent bottle of sparking wine. I've found some of the regular NV Nyetimbers to be a little on the sweeter side however this gets the balance just right.


Also had a bottle of the Charles Heidsieck Milleseme 2000 a few months ago, i don't remember it too much but i recall thinking it didn't quite justity its price tag compared to some very good offerings.

I've also had some great offerings by Vilmont and Co and Billecart Salmon recently.


My wifes recently bought a bottle of Veuve Cliquot Demi Sec which i'm quite intrigued by. I've never had a Demi Sec (nor a Sec to be honest) and normally would steer away from sweeter offerings but i'm looking forward to trying it.

And finally

I'm also on the lookout for something a little bit special to celebrate passing my final accounting exams so was looking for advice. Price is probably up to £250ish but as you can see below, most i've looked at fall well below this.

My current list to consider goes as follows

Cristal - £150ish
Krug - £120ish

The above 2 i think speak for themselves, whilst i've heard Cristal might not quite justify the pricetag for any champagne lover i think i have to try them at some point in my life and they have that obnoxious celebratory feel about them.


Gosset

A bottle of vintage Gosset. Probably the Blanc de Blancs Celebris. Gosset has always been a firm favourite of mine and is close to my heart as we had the Grande Reserve at our wedding.


Armand de Brignac

Not really even sure what this is like, however the bottle alone is fantastic and something i've always told myself i'll try one day. Not too sure of the differences between the coloured bottles though probably would be the gold one around the £220 ish mark


Billecart-Salmon Blanc de Blancs 2004 - £120ish

As above, i like the regular expressions of Billecart-Salmon so it's an option. Just don't know if it feels celebratory enough for the occasion.


Moet Grand Vintage - '90,'93,'94 - £120-£150

I'm in a bit of a minority of champagne lovers in that i'm quite a big fan of the regular NV expression. I have however tried the 2004 Vintage bottle which i thought was terrible. The appeal here would be a rare opportunity to try something so old. Just don't know if i would enjoy it enough.


Perriet Jouet Belles Epoque - £120ish

I really like the NV version of Perriet Jouet, for £30 its as good as you can get in my eyes. It was also the first bottle which i bought a magnum of :). This has always been on my list of champagnes to try so i think it fits.


Dom Ruinart 2002 - £120

The Ruinart Blanc de Blancs is a firm favourite of mine along with Gosset Grande Reserve. The regular version also is good just not quite as good as others in the price range for me. The vintage version could be excellent so it makes the list.



Well there we have what i've looked at. Does anyone have any input or suggestions i've not thought about?


EDIT: Christ after posting i didn't realise how long this post was. Maybe i should've made my own thread!
 
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Marvt74 said:
Cristal - £150ish
Krug - £120ish

The above 2 i think speak for themselves, whilst I've heard Cristal might not quite justify the price tag for any champagne lover i think i have to try them at some point in my life and they have that obnoxious celebratory feel about them.
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Even though I haven't tried Cristal, and I do like Louis Roederer, Krug is lovely and certainly which one I'd throw my money at. I bought a bottle of Krug as a friends 50th birthday present, and they said it was gorgeous too.
 
A £50 bottle of Prosecco will be superior to a £50 bottle of Champagne.

There's no point in drinking champagne unless money is no object in my opinion, by that reason alone I very rarely buy champagne.
 
Partial to Roederer NV myself, but the price of a bottle these days makes it a rare treat.

So, here's a handy money saving tip for you: champagne tends to improve with a bit of bottle age. Buy a good quality supermarket own brand (you can usually find what's hot from newspaper reviews) and keep it; preferably for a year or two, but six months will improve it.

I've got into the habit of buying champagne two to three years in advance of drinking it - I can thoroughly recommend the strategy.
 
How have I missed this thread updates?

I had a bottle of Krug the other day. It's my wife's favourite, which isn't dangerous at all. It was the NV variety though, which was 125 I think at Majestic.

One to try though, Salon. They're a part of Laurent Perrier (of which I had a couple of bottles of Rosé LP recently as it was a good deal in the above place!) and they only produce Champagne on a vintage year. Bottles are limited and it's supposed to be the best in the world, so they say, but I'm yet to judge it personally, it's on my list though.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champagne_Salon

If you get a chance to, also try and get some of the older vintages of the Louis stuff. I love a nice bottle of vintage Louis, but the prices for NV stuff at the moment is about 40quid over in the UK and about 45euros as well. I heard it was due to shocking harvests driving up the prices of the NV stuff. Also, the white boxed NV stuff seems a lot more young and tart than the yellow/ gold labeled stuff, so I'd recommend that latter.
I can still just about get hold of a '95 louis in Switzerland for about 100 CHF or 70quid? I think it is, but it's a really nice year for it.

My best mate bought me a magnum of 2005 (or 2006 I think?) Cristal, in it's wooden box and all, for my wedding present last year. My wife and I have been saving it for the borth of our girl and since that's happened, I'll be indulging when I get back home.

Being back in the UK and up here in t'North, I've certainly noticed the lack of choice in supermarkets!
 
Also, the Salmon shouldn't cost that, I can get the 99 BbB for 82CHF, which is like 50quid. I'd send you a bottle if you're getting charged 120!

Perrier Jouet Belle isn't worth that sort of money IMO. It's a very bright number, but depends on what you like really. I prefer the more yeasty biscuity likes of bottle, which tends to be more pinot noir grape.

Don't really rate DP or vintage Moet (same houses anyway) though I have had one cracking old DP but in general for the money not keen.

Gosset Brut is nice, but not had a BdB.

Not had an Ace of Spades, but again on my to have list. I liked the Ruinart NV I had, but I've not had any vintages to give a good opinion tbh.

Some others though:

Tattinger Compes de Champagne 2000

Pol Roger Winston Churchill 2000

Philipponnat clos des goisses

Deutz

Bollinger Grande Année
 
I had been hoping you'd have posted! Might take you up on the offer to post the Salmon though if you're serious!

As for the Salon. I was in one shop who suggested the same thing. Apparently they also have a joint venture with another house to produce NV champagnes which are very good. Think they had a couple bottles in but I didn't buy one (I will though)
 
This has reminded me to get my pictures from my recent visit to Salon off the camera. If they're any good I'll stick them up here.

The current release is the 2002 and it is the best young champagne I've tasted to date (have tried it 3 times now). However I don't really like my champagne young and prefer it with a lot more maturity so would like to see how it is in 10 years or so.

The sister house to Salon is Delamotte. We had the Brut NV at my wedding and they also make a couple of top quality Blanc de Blancs (vintage and NV) and a very pale rosé.
 
If you like extra dry, with a yeasty taste I'd give Bolly RD a go. Different to normal Bolly - with the 1996 edging ahead of the 1997 (I tried both). Mrs got me a 1997 RD for my 40th which is sat in the dark…
RD + strawberries = obscenely good.

Grand Année is all boom, not particularly subtle (the Bolly house style) but the RD is something else.

As the Mrs is french.. I get a stream of French reds and I'll be on the look out for some good 'local-quality' (read better than UK!) champers too.
 
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