Tea at TĪNG Lounge; at Shangri-La The Shard
13 April 2023
World Whisky Day – some tasty options
15 May 2023A Tale Worth Telling
The Champenois have always been rather good at marketing and that’s just as true now as when Dom Pérignon was but a humble cellarmaster
T
hey know how to tell a good story in champagne. While wine businesses elsewhere are often gauche and awkward in their efforts to market their wares, the Champenois have always been that little bit more canny and slick.
The Champenois have always been rather good at marketing and that’s just as true now as when Dom Pérignon was but a humble cellarmaster
T hey know how to tell a good story in champagne. While wine businesses elsewhere are often gauche and awkward in their efforts to market their wares, the Champenois have always been that little bit more canny and slick.
And history has given them some great tales to relate.
Take Dom Pérignon. As well as lending his name to the world’s leading luxury champagne, the chap in the monk’s habit was also the first to make it fizz. Right?
Wrong. Dom Pierre Pérignon (1638-1715) was indeed a Benedictine monk and cellarmaster at the abbey of Hautvillers in Champagne. And, at a time when making wine in Champagne was beset with challenges, he is credited with a number of technical discoveries – just not this one.
Instead, English scientist and physician Christopher Merret is reckoned to have been the first deliberately to add sugar to wine to induce a second fermentation and thus create that trademark fizz.
By the time Dom Pérignon made his ‘discovery’ in about 1697, Merret had been dead for two years.
Add in the fact that sparkling champagne didn’t become popular until about 150 years after the monk’s death and the gloss is somewhat taken off this legendary tale, but the champagne that bears his name remains a byword for luxury. Traditional releases are a reliable drop, but seek out the rarer and older Oenothèque vintages for the greatest interest.
Production is still extremely limited and the wine – overriding all the hype – is arguably the consistently finest prestige cuvée in champagne
Then there is Cristal, a champagne with a history coloured by regal oneupmanship and revolution. The eye-catching clear bottle, typically encased in translucent golden wrap, owes its birth to the huge popularity of champagne among the Russian nobility of the 19th century. Tsar Alexander II wanted something a little more exclusive to set him apart from the crowd at court; he had a word with his contacts at Roederer, and Cristal was the result, named after the uniquely flat-bottomed lead crystal bottles in which it was served.
The Russian Revolution of 1917 wasn’t the greatest news for sales of Cristal, but the Champenois are nothing if not resourceful, and Roederer soon discovered a ready market for its luxury cuvée from Shanghai to San Francisco.
To the company’s immense credit, its devotion to quality over quantity remains unswerving to this day. Production is still extremely limited and the wine – overriding all the hype – is arguably the consistently finest prestige cuvée in champagne.
Cristal and Dom Pérignon are securely at the top of the luxury champagne tree, but they certainly don’t have the market to themselves, and it would be a huge shame to ignore some of the region’s lesser lights.
Gosset, founded in 1584, is the oldest champagne house and while it doesn’t have the fame of its neighbour in the village of Aÿ, Bollinger, its champagnes embody a richness and underlying elegance that make for a supremely opulent and food-friendly glass of fizz.
Alain Thiénot, meanwhile, is one of the great personalities of the Champagne region. Once a grape broker, he has now built one of the region’s leading champagne businesses, using his unmatched knowledge of the vineyards to create La Vigne aux Gamins, a champagne of understated beauty and elegance sourced from a Chardonnay vineyard of great age in the sought-after village of Avize.
There are more examples: the unique terroir of Philipponnat’s Clos des Goisses, a walled sunspot of a vineyard that produces champagne of unparalleled power and concentration – or Champagne Bruno Paillard, the boutique, quality-obsessed personal venture from one of the region’s most powerful businessmen.
All have their tales to tell, even if those narratives will never match the column inches devoted to the myths and legends surrounding the likes of Dom Pérignon and Cristal. But, in the glass as in the telling, each story proves as compelling as the next.
Words: Staff
A Champagne story in four chapters
Chapter 1Moët & Chandon, Cuvée Dom Pérignon 1996 Oenothèque (£175, widely available through merchants). Aged under cork and with a lower dosage than regular DP, this is a big champagne from a big year, supplementing its racy youth with a honeyed, toasty, nutty maturity. Chapter 2
Louis Roederer Cristal 2002 (£150 approx, widely available through merchants). From the greatest champagne vintage of recent years, this is quintessential Cristal, marrying crisp, delicate acidity to an underlying, understated power and poise. It is still youthful and superb with seafood. Chapter 3
Champagne Thiénot La Vigne aux Gamins 2002 (available soon; £125 for the 1999, L’Art du Vin, Four Walls, Christopher Keiller). Purity personified. Don’t expect to be whacked in the face by this 100 per cent Chardonnay champagne; it eschews showiness for the perfectly elegant expression of its Avize vineyard – all zingy citrus fruit, delicacy and crisp, fine acidity. Chapter 4
Champagne Gosset Célébris Extra Brut 1998 (£120 approx, Berry Bros & Rudd, Harrods, Selfridges, Robersons, Fortnum & Mason, Champagne Direct). Remarkable combination of muscle and delicacy, with a low dosage keeping the wine fresh and precise. But don’t be fooled: the rich flavours of roasted almond and stewed fruit make this a match even for lightly cooked red meat and game.