My man from the 'ham. No block. Be passionate and do your thing.
One the L-B VV. It’s really a terrific wine, as is the 2011 as you mention. I wish I had bought more of it when it was sitting around.
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We had a Louis Roederer 242 the other night and liked it. It really suited us. I got it for $50(US) but I can get Taittinger NV for just under that price and probably prefer that a bit to the 242 so I’m not sure I’ll be buying any more. Still, it was nice to try something new and enjoy it. I feel like the more I try new things in champagne, the less I’m pleased with my gambles. I’m feeling more and more that I should just stick with the winners from here on out. I’m tired of saying “sure it’s nice but it’s not as good as XYZ”
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I opened the Perkins Harter 2020 BdN on Friday night, reserving about half the bottle for Saturday night. I completely see the slight natty note @K_John_Joseph mentioned, which after re-reading @ShelbyPerkins post above, I guess it is the reductive signature (I’m still learning here, so I reserve the right to be completely wrong about this). Most prominent to me was the lime (and a little lemon) and a bit of pear, both of which really started to come through on day two. While obviously very different, it reminded me of a young Moet Grand Vintage. I really enjoyed this and look forward to reading other’s notes too.
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I enjoy some aged champagnes – – – the ones that still have a nice acidic drive to them. More often than not, however, I find aged champagne to be lacking in this regard. But I’ve got a small handful socked away that I believe have aging potential.
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John
We brought one to a restaurant in Seattle last night. It was coincidental; I hadn’t seen your note before I had loaded it in the wine refrigerator a while ago. Your TN was spot on.
Cheers,
Warren
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I recall you mentioning that before. I’ll probably start opening more of my 2006’s, and will try to remember to pay closer attention to the scents and flavors.
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I have a couple of the '17 base resting in my cellar.
10 months on the lees, in 65% oak barrel (barrique and foudre, primarily neutral), 35% stainless. No malolactic. Bottled on July 26, 2018; Disgorged on October 15, 2020 (812 days, or ~27 months); 3.5g/L dosage.
I’ve yet to open one. I’m looking forward to your impressions.
Cheers,
Warren
Frank,
Great notes from you and @AstridKG. It sounds like my skipping the 2015 vintage of Emotion was a fortuitous oversight. Hopefully it will come around, although I’ve never had a bottle of '12-'13-'14 that wasn’t stunning since release. It’s one of my favorite rosé champagnes, and one of my favorite wines in general. Vilmart is my #1 holding of grower champagne (unless you consider Roederer a grower). I’ve never had the Cuvée Creation, but have had most vintages of CdC and GCdO since 2002. I love their wines. I find most need a lot of time to show their full potential, with the Emotion being a young drinking outlier.
Next time you you speak to Laurent, ask him why he switched from some of the most beautiful champagne caps to the current boring ones! Luckily, I don’t judge a Champagne by its cover.
I think it was your notes that opened my eyes to Vilmart (as well as Larmandier-Bernier and others).
Cheers and thank you,
Warren
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I traded some communication with Laurent about the 2015 Emotion. Based on that my belief is that we had an off bottle for our tasting, and I agreed that we’d test drive another one and then let him know. He’s not seen the issue we have encountered with the 2015, and FWIW, I gave him a candid account of what we found. So, I’d say suspend judgment until both @AstridKG and I can do a revisit on our bottles we currently have on hand. I want to bring accurate perception about what we taste, but also want to be sure that what’s under the cork is persistent or simply a one-off.
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Ron, the somm at Okta and I were talking about this on Friday evening as we were tasting on the Solera - which, we agreed, needs a couple more months in bottle to settle down and for the cork to lose some elasticity - so people probably want to hold those. They’re also brut nature so some longer-term development might be key to its success.
Reduction is already polarizing - so to have that reduction lifted with CO2 makes it even more pronounced. We were also discussing how difficult is is to describe reduction - how hard it is to describe it to the markeplace, and how that the vocabulary could use some improvement for sure. I’ll have to ice one of the 2020s down and see what my latest feelings are on it. I generally love this wine and find it equally annoying - so I guess it’s anything but boring.
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I think the blanc deserves more attention than it gets. It’s all white chocolate, almond, and salted licorice decadence upfront, followed by chalky, slightly bitter citrus to clean out the filthy excesses of the party in your mouth. This is of a similar character to the rose, maybe a little less flashy ,
but with a touch more depth. It’s odd to me it seems to have been overlooked. This conjures up very appealing Goldie Hawn in “Butterflies are Free” vibes, as did the rose.
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I definitely agree with you.
Have you tried the extra brut? I haven’t myself, which is why I ask.
2017 Michel Gonet ‘Les Hautes Mottes’ Le Mesnil Sur Oger Brut Nature “Les Compères”
Light-bodied, delicate citrus and dryness. Its Brut nature so 0 dosage, but there is a hint balancing sugar there from the grapes. 12.5% Alc. Delicious with sushi.
A grumble though: What kind of pretentious twit waxes champagne corks!?
Oh wait, there’s a picture of a certain bearded and ubiquitous somm/winemaker-as-cherub on the label; mystery solved. (I kid, the guy seems to be involved in a lot of good wines wherever he goes)
It was a messy and painstaking process to get the damn thing open and dropped bits of wax/plastic/whatever into the bubbles.
Wine enjoyment: 92+
Closure: 61 fuggedaboudit
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Curious how the grand reserve stacks up stylistically with the grand cellier. The latter is one of my favorite wines in that price range by a country mile.
A couple bottles served up with homemade chili for the Super Bowl. Chili and champagne is an underrated pairing, in my opinion. Works great.
The Lenoble mag17 is a blanc de blanc from Chouilly. 2.5g/l dosage. First time with this producer, and call me impressed. The wine has ample acidity - I’d go so far as to call it high here. There’s tons of chalky minerality, and on the palette there’s a host of mixed lemons here providing complexity within the citrus range. With air, the flavors and aromas deepened and the autolytic notes came alive, but rather than brioche, I was getting distinct aromas and flavors of Parmesan cheese rind, which only further complemented the chili. I want to say this is unfiltered as I got some ready cloudy leesy residue on those final pours, which were also some of the most flavorful despite the appearance. If I had one knock on this wine it’s that it was lacking a bit in texture, and the bubbles felt markedly larger than other top champagnes. But it’s a small knock.
The Billiot rose is my second of three bottles. Based on my first bottle, I felt it would pair nicely with the menu, which it did. I’ve already written about this wine, and that it was originally a case filler for an online order, but turned out to be a surprise winner for my taste. I get tons of acidity here (blocked malo seems likely). The wine feels quite dry, despite 9g/l dosage (which just goes to show, you can’t judge a wine by the numbers alone). Aromas of fall leaves keep you exploring the glass for some wonderfully complex scents. Excellent QPR here and a producer where I need to explore even more of the range.
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I opened a bottle of '12 Comtes on Friday and it was much better than the last bottle I had in August and carbon copy of the bottle I had almost a year ago. I am just going to repost my note from then. Btw, the 6-pack that the 2 bottles I really enjoyed were purchased locally, but they are gray market bottles with a back label written in French.
“This was a great bottle of Comtes. The nose displayed honeysuckle, lavender, ocean breeze and spice. The palate adds toast, lemon, lime, white peach and honeydew. The finish brings it all home with light brown sugar, almond pastry and cotton candy as well as bright, mouthwatering acidity. This does remind me of the '02 on release, like WK mentioned, but a bit more acidity. Great to drink now, but should age nicely.”
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We had friends over Saturday who are not wine nerds, but do they enjoy wine, so I picked a few bottles that I thought they would like and pair well with the food, without breaking the bank. The magnums of '12 Roederer rosé are drinking really well right now, but they will go the distance if you can keep your hands off of them, which I can’t. Boisson is making some damn good BB and the Progeny cab paired great with the Flannery ribeye.
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Sorry, I have not. I didn’t know there was one.