Veuve Clicquot

I once wrote, 'the greatest tribute I can pay Veuve Clicquot is to say that this house is proof that it is possible to sell eight million bottles a year and still maintain the highest quality.' Well, now it's selling ten million bottles and the quality has never been better. TOM STEVENSON

La Grande Dame comes exclusively from eight grand cru vineyards owned in 1805 by the 27-year-old widow Nicole-Barbe Clicquot-Ponsardin, who drove the business to the top tier of champagne. The wine named in her honor was launched in 1977 to mark the bicentenary of the company.

 Dramatic developments are underway in the bellows of Veuve Clicquot that are only just beginning to bubble to the surface. Its characterful, full-bodied, pinot-focused wines are more refined every time I look, an astounding feat for a house with a dizzying annual production of 18 million bottles, ranking a confident number two by volume behind Moet & Chandon in LVMH champagne Kingdom. Event Clicquot’s conspicuous ‘Yellow Label’ non-vintage, in its inimitable, trademark, mango-orange livery, is looking trim and fit today, having lost its curvaceous sweetness – quite a workout for a cuvee that alone accounts for a whopping 15 million bottles every year. Its vintage wines are where Veuve Clicquot really steps up, and La Grande Dame has entered a new age of dashing, mineral-infused refinement. For an operation of such a grand scale, the consistency of Veuve Cliquot is unrivalled in all of champagne. TYSON STELZER