Celebrity Life

A selection of multi-grape blends from single vintages -- all lending credence to every wine snob's favourite theory that Champagne is predisposed to "ageing gracefully".

For all the information that accompanies widespread internet access and the omnipresent, somewhat dogged spectre of social media, a huge chunk of drinkers remain oblivious to the decisive role lees ageing plays in the production of sparkling wine. Ditto whenever you pop a bottle of Champagne: that famously coveted regionality of bubbly, that benefits from anywhere between 2-3 years of ageing sur lie for even the most pedestrian of non-vintages.

In contrast to the EU's wider wine-producing industry (where the minimum statutory requirement is 90 days), in Champagne sufficient time spent on fermentation of flavour is deemed indispensable to the overall process. Away from the predations of light, in a CO²-rich environ that's deep underground, the wines of the Champenoise achieve a kind of miraculous metamorphosis: ageing, evolving, revealing complexities of character.

Of course, every Chef de Cave ('cellarmaster') has their own philosophy pertaining to the vicissitudes that accompany extended lees-ageing. Perhaps most controversially, Vincent Chaperon, Dom Pérignon's Chef de Cave, has long maintained that Champagne doesn't evolve linearly, but rather through a series of multi-year cycles he described as "windows of opportunity, or plenitudes". At DP, that hypothesis expresses itself in three distinct bottlings: the first comes 7-8 years after the wine has been sur lie (what most consumers will recognise as DP's signature, vintage-specific Champagne), the second requires 12-15 years, and the third when a vintage wine has matured on lees for at least two decades. Amongst the brand's devotees, the intermediate 'window' has always been popular, largely because of its association with the 'P2' label -- the most recent expression of which pivots around the famously "challenging" vintage of 2003.

Put plainly, in 2021, there are no shortage of serious Champagne houses releasing cuvées which bear the unmistakable mark of a long sleep in the cellar. In concert with grapes borne of excellent soil and weather, extended lees-ageing can bolster the cellaring potential of a given vintage 10, 20, occasionally even 30 years. At the very least? The process makes for bubbly that is delicious and eminently drinkable. Amidst the height of the Hong Kong summer, you'll find a few of my personal favourites below.

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