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Cellar Favorite: 2002 & 2004 Dom Pérignon
France: Champagne, cellar favorite, Cellar Favorites
, Dec 2022
A recent family gathering provided a great opportunity to check in on two of my favorite Dom Pérignons.
Cellar Favorite: Raiding the Cellar at Inspire Napa Valley
France: Champagne, cellar favorite, Cellar Favorites, France: Alsace, France: Burgundy
, Aug 2022
I was thrilled to open this eclectic collection of wines from my cellar during this year’s Inspire Napa Valley dinner at Staglin. It’s a rare treat to take a break from the hectic pace of tasting wines for review and actually drink a few things for pleasure.
The 2022 Champagne New Releases
France: Champagne, featured
, May 2022
This 2022 Spring Preview takes a look at releases that are new in the market. The pace of change in Champagne remains quite fast, with new wines appearing regularly pretty much every year now. Readers can expect to see additions to this article in the coming weeks and months.
The Wines That Shaped My Life
France: Champagne, Germany, New Zealand, France: Bordeaux, France: Rhône & Beaujolais, France: Burgundy, featured
, Mar 2022
A charity dinner themed around the significant wines of my career threw up a couple of surprises. I doubt DRC and Blue Nun have ever found themselves reviewed in the same article. In these days of bleak headlines, the vignettes accompanying these eclectic wines hopefully put a smile on your face.
Pol Roger: 2022 New Releases
France: Champagne, featured
, Mar 2022
I was quite impressed with these new releases from Pol Roger. The 2013 Sir Winston Churchill is a superb Champagne in a superb vintage, but it should be that. I am more struck by the quality of the 2015s, Champagnes that deliver plenty of Pol Roget stylishness without the awkward edges that are such an issue throughout the region.
Cellar Favorite: Bollinger: 2022 New Releases
France: Champagne, cellar favorite, Cellar Favorites
, Mar 2022
Bollinger fans will want to be sure to check out these new releases. I was quite taken with the Champagnes I tasted recently with General Manager Charles-Armand de Belenet and Deputy Cellar Master Denis Bunner.
2014 Roederer Cristal
France: Champagne, featured
, Feb 2022
The 2014 Cristal is another in a long line of gorgeous wines from Roederer and long-time Chef de Caves Jean-Baptiste Lécaillon. A dazzling, vibrant Champagne, the 2014 impresses with a stunning combination of fruit density and linear energy that bring to mind a hypothetic blend of 2012 and 2008. At times, the bubbles feel totally wrapped up in waves of creamy, resonant fruit to the point the mousse is barely perceptible, especially with aeration. The flavors are bright and finely sculpted, leaning very much into the citrus, floral and mineral end of the spectrum.
Champagne: 2021 New Releases
France: Champagne, featured
, Nov 2021
After a brutal year in 2020 in which sales slumped dramatically, Champagne has come back with a vengeance. Demand and enthusiasm are high, no doubt buoyed by a return to more or less ‘normal’ conditions, whatever that means these days. Readers will find an extraordinary range of Champagnes in the market that span the entire stylistic spectrum ranging from the glitziest grande marque new releases to small-production artisan bottlings.
Champagne: 2020 New Releases
France: Champagne, featured
, Nov 2020
For the first time in a dozen years, this past spring I was unable to travel to Champagne to taste the new vintage and survey the latest releases. Given the extraordinary challenges this year of both traveling and collecting hundreds of samples in a timely fashion, we will be publishing Champagne reviews within this article in a continuous stream over coming weeks and months, as I taste the wines. This latest installment covers wines tasted in October and November 2020. The best way to stay up to date on additions is to make sure you are receiving our emails and turn on notifications within the Vinous app.
Krug: 2006 In Three Acts
France: Champagne, featured
, Sep 2020
Clos du Mesnil is one of the most revered sites in Champagne. Rémi and Henri Krug bought the 1.84-hectare vineyard in 1971 with the goal of securing a high-quality fruit source. But once they started working with the fruit, they realized they had something special. The first Clos du Mesnil, the 1979, remains epic to this day. Although not be design, Clos du Mesnil is also the archetype for what many grower Champagnes would later become – single vineyard, single variety, single vintage wines. I recently had the chance to taste the 2006 Clos du Mesnil, the latest release, with Olivier Krug over Zoom, which is how everything seems to happen these days.