Holiday Buying Guide: Gary’s Favorite Champagne Gifts
Champagne Bottle of the Year
My bottle of the year has to be the Billecart-Salmon Brut Rosé Champagne $84.99. Not only does it define the rosé Champagne category with its effortless ease of drinking and perfect balance, but it also came down $10 in a period where everything just kept going up in price. This Champagne’s supply is limited by the amount of old-vine Pinot Noir that the Billecart family can source from just one village, Mareuil-sur-Aÿ. And when they say old vines, they mean it: only massal-selected plots from before the 1970s are used for the red wine that goes into this masterpiece—vines of 60 to 80 years old!
It is composed of 40% Chardonnay, 30% Pinot Noir, and 30% Meunier and is mostly fermented in stainless steel. The reserve wine added is often over 50% of the blend. The results are amazing—a pale pink Champagne with wonderful fresh baguette and bright strawberry aroma; a silky, tiny pearl of bubbles that give incredible texture; a fresh, dry finish that makes you always want another sip… But yet it also has great depth for those who take a moment to close their eyes and really taste the wine. The chalk of Champagne is as well represented as the perfectly ripe fruit that gives it the lovely pink color. If you love Champagne, and have never treated yourself to this, you deserve it. If you have loved it in the past, do not fear, it has only gotten better!
Have Them Join the Club!
If you have a Champagne lover in your family, or a Champagne lover who is a friend, my top recommendation for a gift for them is our Champagne Club. Every other month, every Club member gets a shipment of two bottles, for a total of 12 bottles per year, at a price of just $69.95 per shipment. In this Club, members tour the sub-regions and styles of Champagne continuously. In the past year we covered everything from the far southern border near Burgundy, to the far west near Paris, to the far east past Chalons to the heart of the Grand Crus of the Marne, Côte de Blancs, and Montagne de Reims. We have had vintage, pure Meunier, Blanc de Blancs, and rosé—and the next 12 months will be even better. Every shipment comes with a newsletter explaining each Champagne’s composition, aging, and the philosophy of the people who grew the grapes and made the wine. Even long-time Champagne fans will have new discoveries to make with each shipment.
Ain’t No Party Like a Magnum Party
If you have the chance to visit Champagne, one thing you will learn from visiting multiple producers is that they disagree about just about everything: wood vs. stainless steel, making the malolactic fermentation or blocking it, the grape varieties that are best… I could go on and on. There is one point of unanimity in the region: the best size bottle for the best Champagne in the glass—namely the magnum. Because of the extra wine as opposed to air space, you get the same slower ageing effect here that you would anywhere, but in the Champagne region you almost always get more actual ageing in magnums since this size needs it. The result is the best of both worlds- more freshness, but also more depth and texture from aging.
For me, the best example of this is the Aspasie “Brut Prestige” Champagne $84.99. In regular bottle, the current batch is 10 years old and composed entirely of the 2013 vintage; the magnum, however, is 2011, and gets that extra two years of aging on the lees in their cellar in Brouillet. It is composed of 50% Chardonnay, 25% Pinot Noir, and 25% Meunier from estate vines of over 60 years. With all of that time, it has a brioche-laden toasty nose that is decadent and rich; but due to the age of the vines, the structure of the wine is still ultimately fresh and lively. The depth and complexity of this Champagne is something fans of bubbles should all try once, and the holidays are a perfect chance to have the group to drink it!
Champagne Gifts Under $100
When it comes to gifts under $100, it is hard to do better than the Champagnes from Launois in Mesnil. These wines have an accessibility that makes them the hit of every party; they are a gift that is always appreciated. The value for money will be your secret!
Starting with the Launois "Cuvée Réservée" Grand Cru Brut Blanc de Blancs Champagne $34.99, an all Chardonnay, all–Grand Cru marvel that spends three years aging on its lees. It is hard to believe that we can still offer this for such a great deal. This wine, like all of their wines, is 100% estate-grown fruit and does not use any purchased plants from vine nurseries in the vineyard—at Launois, they do all of their own massal selections and propagations to ensure the highest quality. The wine has lovely toast, a creamy texture. and a definitively chalky finish from the best dirt in all of Champagne for Chardonnay, the Grand Crus of the Côte des Blancs. In fact, the primary village for this Champagne is Mesnil, the most expensive vineyard land in all of Champagne!
If you want to give something even more special, the Launois "Quartz" Brut Blanc de Blancs Champagne $39.99 is in fact a single-vineyard Champagne from Les Chetillons, a famous parcel that growers like Pierre Peters sell for close to $200. This wine has more white fruit and white flower exoticism on the front end than the reserve, but the back end has even more of the pure chalk minerality than one could wish for!