The novice buys Champagne
 

I bought the nectar Imperial and the Imperial

How did I do?

Doug
After you finish the first bottle, it doesn't matter what the second tastes like.:lmao:

I am not much of a Champagne Aficionado so I am no help here.

'panther piss' ...........:banana: .......on the serious side, if you like it , who cares ?

Happy New Year !!!

:redface-oops-6::roflmao::roflmao::roflmao:


I guess I will ASK first then buy

All I know about champagne is that Dom Perignon is sex in a bottle. :)

Oh gross:yikes::twisted:

I guess you had a Happy Holiday,:scratch2:

:D

Bob

Tattinger was my fave. Fruity and creamy. Or you could try Pol Roger, Bollinger, Moet et Chandon, Heidseck. I think that's about it,I.I.R.C.

It is Moet et Chandon guess I should have mentioned that:redface-oops-6:

There are tons of great champagnes out there, and many are small producers (unlike, say, Cliquot or Moet).

Easy to find good stuff that won't break the bank: (all Brut) Piper Heidseick, Moet Imperial (White Star), Veuve Cliquot, Perrier Jouet, Laurent-Perrier, Tattinger.

Easy to find that can break the bank: (all Brut) Moet Dom Perignon, Veuve Cliquot La Grande Dame, Perrier Jouet (Flower Bottle), Laurent-Perrier Gran Siecle, Louis Roderer Cristal, Bollinger Grand Anee or RD, Krug NV.

How about some Martini & Rossi Asti Spumante :)

Great Champagnes are also made by very small producers and sold directly.
I was afan of Ruinart and the more fruity Pommery, but I had one year a very bad experience with Ruinart.
Each year, we order about 120 bottles. We keep about 20 for us and the remaining are for gifts.
One year, each and every Ruinart was just aweful. The Rosé was undrinkable, and the Blanc was drinkable but disappointing. Public price : 40 euros the bottle.
So one friend told us about this small producer : Moreau Billard. For both Rosé and Blanc. 13 euros per bottle. Direct from the cave. We tried. Holy Mackerel ! This Moreau Billard puts the Ruinart to shame !
Not comparable with the great great ones at about 100 euros the bottle, but can stand the fight against most "economic" Champagnes.
Unfortunately, I 'm not sure if Moreau Billard would send to the US. But it may be possible.

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Jérôme...Happy New Year! What would you recommend that is dry, crisp, effervescent on the tongue when compressed? It has to have a strong epernay flavour. I love yeasty undertones.

Hi Steve ! Happy New Year !
Unfortunately, I don't have the ability to answer because I tend to escape from the really dry Champagnes, at least at economic prices.
I like them semi dry like the Moreau Billard or even juicy like the Pommery. I would say thet the R by Ruinart seems to fit your needs and is almost always tasting the same, since it is a blend. But as I said, one year we really had a problem with them.
The best one I tasted in your description is the Veuve Clicquot Grande Dame but it's expensive and may cost around 250 dollars a bottle in the US.

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Veuve Clicquot Grande Dame Vintage....YUM! For special occasions. :D

Steve, you've been drinking beer again haven't you? ;)

:lmao:

It's going to be a scorcher this week in Melbourne. I will probably try a few icy cold beers. :beerchug:

:lmao:

I am with Jérôme on this one!
 

Champagne Guy Faucheret

Another one of these gorgeous 'little' champagnes, in a very nice village near Epernay: Vertus.

http://www.bonnet-launois.fr/images/vertus5.jpg

Very high rates in the Guide Hachette.
Very reasonable prices, they export abroad.

This one is their classic:
http://sc.cellartracker.com/labels/1220957945/76167.jpg

And this is their top bottle: very gentle but quite strong and nice aftertaste:
http://sc.cellartracker.com/labels/1220958127/76172.jpg


We usually go there ourselves and load our trunk as full as we can, for the whole family. :banana:

Bart.... :banana: I'll check the local bottlo.

We're in Europe later in the year. I'm suggesting to The Lady to swing the itinerary in this direction. The French countryside sure looks wonderful.

How is Belgium in the summer? :D

Jerome you're reminding me of my early Champagne days. We had a customer in the mid 70s who also owned a wine store. When he made the trip to Coral Gables from Palm Beach he always brought a case or two of wines he thought might be of interest. One of those trips introduced me to Ruinart. At the time it was a quarter of the price of Cristal, Taittinger, and Perignon.

A few years later I remember moving to California and finding that Ruinart was becoming the hip LA choice. There was a killer store on Sunset that had Ruinart at its new list price - 3 times what I paid when I first bought it 5 years earlier! But the other three were the best deal ever - 2/3 the new price of a Ruinart! Imagine a Cristal at $29.95!

Our favorite for the last 23 years though has been La Grande Dame. Certainly there are others as good, even better, but La Grande Dame is what we drank on our second honeymoon at the Salzburg Music Festival. It's for special occasions but there's a certain magic every time we pop one open. :naughty:

http://www.bottlerocket.com/media/ca...62.jpg.jpg.jpg

Bill,
nice story !
1998 is of the best year ever for the Grande Dame :thumbsup: !

Ha, 4 seasons in one day!
You can have 34°C and a couple of hours later, after some good rains, 15°C.

Wonderful food, lovely old towns, and over 1000 beers!!!

Here are some of them, just to get an idea:
Belgian Beers - Belgium Travel Guide - Eupedia
Lijst van Belgische bieren - Wikipedia

These are pics of villages and cities nearby:

http://fotogeniekbelgie.files.wordpr...e-16.jpg?w=700
http://fotogeniekbelgie.files.wordpr...e-01.jpg?w=700
http://i1.trekearth.com/photos/3420/...kortrijk_2.jpg
http://static.skynetblogs.be/media/1...3b8036407c.jpg
http://www.trabel.com/brugge/images/...edkaai%202.jpg
http://www.visitgent.be/sites/defaul...ens_gent10.jpg

Steve,
Will you come to Paris ?

just bustin' your stones a wee bit Doug........I wouldn't know a good from a bad champagne if I tried.

It's all good I would feel neglected if People didn't here :yes:

Jérôme...I wouldn't mind but The Lady doesn't think we will have time to fit it in on this trip. Last time, unfortunately I got food poisoning from a hamburger restaurant on Bld Montmartre & was bed ridden for 48 hours+ so our time was cut short. Although I've visited Paris a few times, I've never been during the mid summer holidays.

For reasonably priced sparkling wine/champagne we find Chandon(s) to be a very good choice. For our fish meals on a twice-a-week basis we like Freixenet (will be visiting them this spring). For my birthday next week, we (make that me) bought a couple of bottles of Veuve Clicquot (one for the week and one for dinner that day), which we both think is most excellent.

"Our" Champagne house says the nectars go to the US.
It has 5 times more sugar added in the end of the process than the brut.
We prefer the extra brut.
At Guy Faucheret (see my post earlier in this thread), it is called Dosage Zéro: no liquor in the end, they make it with a pure Millésime.
It's very sharply priced at less than 20€.
They deliver it to the Rothschild family (we saw the labels on a couple of separate pallets).
If it's good for them, it's good for us! :D

One of the problems at smaller champagne houses, like Guy Faucheret, is their limited volume. When we spent a week in Epernay a couple of years ago several we visited were sold out to the Chinese and the Germans and had not a single bottle to sell. Good for them (I guess), but sad for the rest of us. Another problem, as Jerome has mentioned, is these smaller houses often do not export outside the EU. Have checked with a couple of the bigger wine sellers in the U.S. and don't have or know who might. Visiting the "Champagne Region" is the best we can do.

Au contraire, Dave. Even you could tell the difference. ;) Seriously.

I made this trip with Bart when I visited in 2016 and very much enjoyed Champagne Guy Faucheret's rose. I brought a bottle back with me and my wife enjoyed it.

Bart bought so many bottles from the owner that the lady just gave me one for free :D

Never drank a Champayne I didnt like.

My all time favourite is Perrier Jouet Belle Epoque.


Due to its relatively high cost- only drink on very special occasions

Often I have a champagne party this season but... too much gear this year. In the US it’s hard to get a line on the small houses. And the vintages at the big houses can be variable and a risk at US prices. I was glad to see Taittinger’s Comtes de Champagne was back with their 2005, for example, but between 1998 and then was a bit hit/miss IMHO (and I like that style). If I don’t want to risk it, Krug nv is always a good standby (when bolder will do). Sadly the market is efficient (*ahem* Salon).

Like gear, everyone has their preferences. And there are great small houses if you can find them.

Got talked into a bottle of Bollinger Brut Special Cuvee in place of our usual Vueve Clicquot. Looking forward to 'popping the cork'. The buyer for the store told me that Bollinger has been providing the best of "big house" wines for the past few years. None of the variance that the others have suffered, though I've not had a bad bottle of Vueve Clicquot in the 30+ years we've been drinking it.

Doug.......Toured the Korbel Winery in Napa Valley quite a few years ago. It was very interesting to learn how many processes take place to bring their products from grapes in the field to Wine and Champagne. We spent some time in their tasting room at the end of the tour and enjoyed sampling several wines and their Brut Champagne. As I remember their Brut Champagne was very good.


https://cdn.nexternal.com/korbel/images/BRUT_MAIN3.jpg


A reasonably priced light sparkling white wine that I enjoy is Freixenet Cordon Negro Brut. I keep several bottles on hand as everyone enjoys it.


https://cdn6.bigcommerce.com/s-b0811...80.480.JPG?c=2

Cold Duck. Doesn't anyone drink Cold Duck these days? ;) Do they still "brew" Cold Duck? Been quite a while since I've seen it (though I'm not really looking).

Dan - Excellent choices at reasonable prices.

I need to get out more. I thought Champagne was only consumed at weddings, topless ballets, and by coke heads. I've been watching too many movies. :D

My weapon of choice... :wine:

https://img.thewhiskyexchange.com/90..._cri2004v3.jpg

Have you tried any of the sparkling Pinot/Chard blends from Australia? We've been pleased with Brown Bros. Cab & Shiraz, but have not found any of their sparkling wines in the U.S.

On guard!

Ivan - can I pick up my E-270? You get the champagne and I'll bring 4-dozen Cape May Salts. ;)