An anomalous 2006 Taittinger Comtes de Champagne and 1996 Williams Selyem Sonoma County Pinot Noir

My sweetie and I enjoyed a Valentine dinner at our favorite local restaurant, The Stonehouse. Our MO is to take a good champagne and a Burt Williams made Pinot from 1997 or older which we did on this night although the wines demonstrated some surprisingly differences from expected:

2006 TAITTINGER COMTES de CHAMPAGNE BLANC de BLANC- I’ve lost count of the number of bottles Ive had of this fine bubbly, but it approximates 50 including magnums; the vast majority of the bottles were spectacular and similar in almost every aspect, but a couple were not and this was one of them; it seemed a bit tight and closed although on its own and in a blind format, I would have been quite pleased to have had it; compared to most other bottles, this was very understated with milder aromas and tastes and devoid of the toasty brioche character so many have had; the latter point suggests this bottle came from a more recent additional buy I made and possibly from a newer released batch where the Maillard reaction has yet to occur; I should have kept them separate and stored them accordingly; lesson learned; back to this bottle- it had mellow lemon and lime notes with some green apple and a light, frothy mouse plus an underlying hint of chalk and saline; there was more emphasis on elegance and charm and less on being full and rich; actually, it was very similar to an 08 Laurent-Perrier drank a couple of days prior and that was a really good champagne, just not in the same league as the best of the Comtes 06`s.

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1996 WILLIAMS SELYEM SONOMA COUNTY PINOT NOIR- my goodness, this started out with a very different profile than expected following the anomalous light weight 06 ` Comtes, I’m thinking my palate may need a perception change- pass the bread and crackers please or go back outside and re-enter. For the first 25 minutes or so, this had smoke laden burnt red cherry/ berry notes and I just could not accept that was where it was supposed to be and sure enough, after carpal tunnel straining repeated swirling, it slowly morphed into an entirely different place, eventually giving up the expected cinnamon and spice accented red raspberry and red cherry flavors experienced in previous bottles; I believe there was some Summa and Olivet Lane fruit in this release and any Pinot with Summa has got to be good and this eventually got to that lovely place. I usually decant these wines, if only for a few minutes, but did not do so with this bottle; now I know that would have saved a lot of time and allowed for this bottle to reach its treasured state much sooner.

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Reassured my palate had not hit the wall and happy to be sitting across from the love of my life while dining at one of our favorite restaurants on the planet, it was a stellar evening,

Cheers,
Blake

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Had to look up Maillard reaction. Interesting to think about aging Champagne along that dimension. Have you had 50 bottles of the 06 specifically or Comtes generally? Good for you either way! I have been sampling old vintages during the pandemic—69, 71, 73, 90 and just love them with age.

-Michael

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Michael, the count I’m referring to relates to the 06` Comtes. I’ve had a pretty serious love affair with it since release.

Good for you re the visit to the older vintage bubbly. My experience in general has been that most get monostylistic with similar dark gold or golden brown coloring {monochromatic}, notes of caramel, butterscotch, almonds and in advanced cases, Sherry like and I much prefer them much earlier before they get to that state.

If you have not already done so, you may want to look up previous threads re the 06` Comtes. Most notes and especially mine, indicate a much different profile than the bottle I’m referencing here. Also, there’s some motions re the Maillard reaction that elaborates on this process.

Beautiful sentiments as always, my friend.

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Blake,

You likely got an off or variable bottle of 06 Comtes BdB. I don’t think the Maillard reaction had much to do with it. While this reaction can start to occur soon after disgorgement, IMO, you don’t truly start to get big effects until the wine gets quite a bit of time under its post-disgorgement age belt. As for the different disgorgement dates that the 06 Comtes BdB saw, I am not sure how large the window was, but the lot number on the bottle will tell you the approximate date of your bottle. In my experience, when this wine is on, it is on regardless of disgorgement date.

Another way of looking at this is - even if this was a later disgorged batch, most folks have enjoyed earlier disgorged bottles over the past few years. In theory, you could say that those earlier disgorged bottles, when consumed, probably saw a similar amount of post-disgorgement age as a current, later disgorged bottle. That would mean that they each would have seen a similar amount of Maillard reaction progress. Yes, there are plenty of other variables that come into play and can affect things between disgorgement dates, but sometimes in a large volume wine, you get off bottles or variation. Just my two cents.

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Nice work. 1996 WS Hirsch one of the best Pinot based wines I’ve ever had, regardless of region.

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After 6 awesome bottles of 2006 Taittinger Comtes over the years, I got an incredibly average one recently. That still beats the track record of every other champagne I’ve had, but was nonetheless quite disappointing since it was my wife’s birthday dinner and she loves champagne.

My note:
I have 6 notes between 93-95 points, and this bottle was significantly less impressive. This bottle drank like a low-end NV champagne, pleasant enough, some brioche and pear, a touch of elegance, but none of the magic that previous bottles had.

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Thanks Brad for your feedback here. I’m thinking it was just " an off or variable bottle". I looked for some indication/ lot number as to disgorgement dates and found none assuming the bar code does not contain it and the 1/1 is not it. I do have 2 more bottles that I’m pretty sure were part of the more recent reload, so I’ll open one of them down the line and see about similarities or not.
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Blake,

The lot number would be laser etched on the glass; it is normally near the bottom of the bottle under the level of the label and can take quite a bit of turning the bottle and proper lighting to see.

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The Maillard Reaction sounds like an indie film festival darling.

Oh, Blake. He’s sooooooo romantic.

Ooooh, or a CW Show!

"They started High School as ‘ugly ducklings’ but this Senior Year they’ll Take Everyone’s Breath Away… "


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Maybe it was part of The China Syndrome.

Thanks Brad. I find F23 and S6 etched. Can you interpret this? I just sent an email to the house also.

Blake,

It sounds like you might be looking at the bottom of the bottle. I should have been more clear. The Lot number is still on the main body of the bottle, just towards the bottom and often just under the back or front label. For example, under the back label of the bottle you might find a hard to see laser etched lot code of something like L7313…; this code means the bottle was disgorged in late 2017 or sometime around the 313th day of 2017.

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Brad, I found an etched code just below the label: L7104UH03500. So, if I interpret this according to your example, this would have been disgorged on the 104th day of 2017. OMG, I’ve been missing this for a LONG time. I had to take the bottle out in the sunlight to find the code and then use a magnifying glass, so, no wonder. just never thought a close up inspection would b e necessary.

Blake,

Not necessarily on that exact date, but close enough (within a few months). It is the only clue on the Comtes bottle that gives you any details. In 2014, they added a QR code to most of their wines to give you disgorgement, bottling, and base info information, but the Comtes line was excluded. Since then, the QR codes appear to have stopped working so we are left to search for the almost invisible lot number on the bottle to get our information.

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Strange that they chose to exclude it for their flagship product and too bad that they subsequently discontinued the practice. This would have been helpful and easily accessible information for the consumer to have (as opposed to a quasi-invisible etching on the bottle with a cryptic numbering system), at little to no cost to Taittinger, and could probably have been combined with some anti-counterfeiting features to boot.

Good info. Much appreciated Brad.

So, if in fact, the bottle in question was disgorged in early-mid 2017, there would be some time for evolution even including the Maillard reaction, yes? If so and since this was devoid of any of the usual toasty brioche notes, it might be even more accurate to suggest this was an off bottle. ???

Blake,

Yes, I am sure some degree of Maillard reaction had ocurred, but I am in the camp that it takes many years for the real effects of the post-disgorgement Maillard reaction to be felt; this reaction happens very slowly under the conditions of a normally stored Champagne. Most of what I think you are tasting with the 2006 Comtes is from the wine’s general character, touches of oak, autolysis, and whatever may have been done with the dosage. I feel the Maillard reaction effects are still years away. Both autolysis and the Maillard reaction can have similar toasted, roasted, nutty notes, but I find the pastry, toasty, biscuity, baked bread notes on wines that are less than five years post-disgorgement to be much more driven by the effects of autolysis (and other things) rather than the Maillard reaction. In the big picture, both autolysis and the Maillard reaction contribute to the post disgorgement development of the wine. It is this pair along with other reactions that occur with the introduction of oxygen and the liqueur d’Expedition at disgorgement that really drive how Champagne develops.

After that long winded explanation, the short answer is that, yes, I think you had an off/variable bottle. As I have stated elsewhere, I feel variable or boring bottles of the 06 Comtes BdB are higher than in most other vintages of Comtes, but on the bright side, most 06 Comtes BdB is yummy, yummy, yum.

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