“Trend” just means a general direction in which something is developing or changing. “Trendy,” which means fashionable or up to date, is a different thing. The first doesn’t imply the second.
I have tried to age some of my NV stuff. Example…holding onto an older disgorgement of NV Vilmart Rubis and NV Tarlant Brut Zero Rose. The former has about 8 grams, the other zero grams. Not sure how they will age but I’ll see. Aside from these, and I do buy some NV from other producers, I mostly drink my NV pretty quickly but I let my vintage stuff age.
As to getting enough info on what went into the NV you may own, it’s producer dependent. For the producers I buy that make NV (Vilmart, Mousse, Laherte Freres, Tarlant, Larmandier-Bernier come to mind), they all have disgorgement and dosage info on the bottle, whether it be printed back label or code etching on the glass. And some of these give you some of the vintage info, or, you have to do some homework to deduce it (whether its on their website or in the literature). I recognize some people don’t want/care to go to this degree but the answers are available (at least on those I listed).
One thing too I have learned about low/no dose (which is mostly what I enjoy). And some may say it’s perception or whatever, but I have found that low/no dose really can shine and provide expression IF they are not consumed too cold. Some folks get turned off by this style of Champagne, and I get it, but I have learned through time now that these wines do best with a light chill, which allows the textures and fruit to blossom out. I have catalogued this dynamic now many times, I know for me (in my perception) that it holds true.
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That’s not really what I was getting at with “trend.” I do see lower dosage more often than say 10 years ago. Of course the grapes are often riper, so perhaps the lower dosage balances with potentially lower acidity.
It’s not at all about trendy, at least from producers I would likely buy from.
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While some NV Champagnes may hold for 10+ years, I would be really surprised if they appreciably improve for that length of time. Depending on the strength of the base vintage, if you are fortunate enough to know it, perhaps 10 years is realistic for continued improvement. But with the amount of reserve wines added to most NV, I would guess most reach their sweet spot considerably sooner. For me, that is 3-5 years.
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Hard to say how well the contemporary NVs age, but I’ve had dozens and dozens of fantastic Champagnes that have been just the basic NVs of many grandes marques. They probably haven’t been anything interesting upon release, but they have been outstanding now, 25 to 40 years after the vintage. Some have been even among the best Champagnes I’ve tasted.
So if you haven’t tasted any older NVs, be prepared to be really surprised. Many can age exceptionally well.
I agree on all counts, including that it’s hard to know how the contemporary ones will age, for various reasons, including the move to lower dosage. If the Boulard I described in my OP is representative or an outlier - who knows? But it was a very clear trajectory and easy to follow as we drank it often, probably went through 4 cases starting in 2016.
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I wonder how cases based on 2018 or 2019 would progress. Climate is a constant influence.
I;'m going to toss this topic to Arthur Larmandier as a topic/question for the Zoom this Saturday. I’d be keen on his take, since he makes both Longitude and Latitude as NV, but there is a good portion of ‘base’ plus some reserve, akin to what Michael says above.
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I’ve wondered as well, with vintage and climate changes, and since it’s now usually made as Brut nature.
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Anyone who routinely enjoys 25-40 year old Champagnes, regardless of pedigree, is probably okay that they are often pretty close to a still wine. And I would say the characteristics of Champagnes that old while possibly having their own charms, are not what the vast majority of enthusiasts consider ideal. So consider yourself special.
Out of sheer curiosity, is there anything scientific that makes single vintage wines more ageworthy than NV? It’s all fermented grape juice after all, other just made from juice pressed in a single year, and other from juice pressed from multiple year products?
It is my understanding that the addition of reserve wines, some of which can be quite old, give the NV complexity that would take many years of aging of vintage wines.
1990 was 32 years ago. the best ones are still young.
![[scratch.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/4/42a16863a8714da3c1604419e3eb9206bb87aa50.gif "scratch"){kind=small}
Could you please elaborate? I don’t see what these wines have to do with a still wine.
And I would say the characteristics of Champagnes that old while possibly having their own charms, are not what the vast majority of enthusiasts consider ideal. So consider yourself special.
Lol what 
I might be a special person in many ways, but from what I’ve witnessed, liking aged Champagne isn’t one of the reasons for it. ![[wink.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/04707e6a7bbb03e0153e349d8a9270d30e1e9525.gif "wink"){kind=small}
In almost all tastings where these older bubblies have been opened, they’ve been considered among the best wines tasted, if not WotN.
It’s an interesting question. Stevenson’s column is very dogmatic about it, though also quite explicit about the fact that there was no research (as of 2008) into what exact role sugar plays in the aging process.
There are also two separate issues here that are being conflated: longevity per se on the one hand, and the classic aromatic development we associate with Champagne on the other.
It’s clear that dry still white wines can age for a very long time, so the idea that dosage is necessary for longevity per se doesn’t make any sense. The 1982 Chassagne Caillerets I drank last night didn’t get the memo that it needed a dozen grams of sugar added at bottling to have any kind of longevity!
That leaves us with the question of aromatic development. Since Stevenson wrote that piece, there has been more research on Maillard-like reactions between sugar and amino acids that contribute, along with the degradation of sugars to furfurals, to the “classic” aromatic profile of a mature Champagne, i.e. toasty, empyreumatic, caramelized aromas. Without added sugar, it seems unlikely that you’re going to develop those flavors, so your e.g. ten year old Pol Roger wouldn’t taste like Pol Roger without dosage. So added sugar is indeed essential to the “traditional” aromatic profile of mature Champagne, beyond its (important) role of balancing the wine on the palate. A long-lived wine from Champagne without sugar would age like a long-lived white wine from other regions, such as Chablis or the Côte d’Or.
The question about zero dosage then becomes if it is possible to craft compelling and distinctively Champenois wines that evolve gracefully over time without those sugar-derived aromatics and the balancing contribution of sugar on the palate. I strongly believe that it is. But, it is, as Jérôme Prévost puts it, a very unforgiving genre in which to work, and you need concentrated, perfectly ripe fruit to pull it off. In a marginal climate, where many of those who aspire to make no-dosage wines are not always blessed with the best-situated vineyards, and where the quality of farming has historically been rather poor since the late 1960s, that concentration and perfect maturity haven’t always been easy to achieve.
There are, therefore, not a whole lot of example upon which to draw. Cédric Bouchard’s body of work would be very high on my list, as I have quite a bit of experience with 15 year old Bouchard, and I find it to be aging the way I wish all white Burgundies still did. I have also had some non-dosé wines from Larmandier-Bernier with that sort of age on the clock that have aged extremely gracefully. The aromatic evolution is very classy, with the wine taking on some iodine-like nuances, and the fruit tones modulating from the zesty crispness of youth into something rather sweeter and richer; but it is much more subtle than the dramatic shift that occurs with dosé Champagnes after five or six years on cork, with none of the toasty mocha, toffee-apple and caramel flavors that many lovers of mature Champagne cherish.
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Thanks, William, for the illuminating post. And for expanding on the point I tried, awkwardly, to make earlier when I said that you and John had written about how lower dosage champagnes would age, not if they would age. Though I do wonder if other factors are impacting the ultimate aging curve, as seems to have happened with white burgundy.
Sorry I created a bit of a hodgepodge by including several different ponderings in the OP!
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I did a search of the 55 posts in this thread to see if provenance has been mentioned and it has not. It’s probably the single variable most responsible for the final product after 20+ years of bottle aging. I not so long ago opened a few Roederer vintages from the late 90’s that were purchased on release and stored at cellar temperature. They were good and I enjoyed them. But in no way would I say that they were some of the best Champagne experiences of my life. So, it’s all really subjective, wouldn’t you say? One person’s apogee is another’s over the hill. But then I’ve always been of the mind that I would rather drink them 5 years too early than 5 years too late.
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I would say closure and provenance. Together, they’re multiplicative.
brilliant thank you.
interesting to see folks on this thread and that with same/similar takes.