Word: vineyard
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...hold up a sparkling glass of Krug's latest creation in the walled vineyard that produced it - just over half a hectare of perfectly manicured Pinot Noir grape vines in the village of Ambonnay - I try not to do the math that makes this the costliest tipple I am ever likely to have on a Tuesday afternoon. Determined not to be dazzled by its price and rarity, I take a sniff and a sip. The bright golden elixir smells at first like almond blossoms, but the aroma quickly ripens like dark fruit. An exceptionally fine mousse of bubbles seems...
Although the wine's taste is a revelation, the price also reflects the character of its production: it's 100% Pinot Noir, made from a single harvest from a single tiny vineyard. Most champagnes are traditionally blends of Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier grapes harvested from different vineyards (there are over 270,000 individual plots in Champagne) in different years...
Recently, the terroir concept - that a wine should express the specific soil, microclimate and cultural traditions that produced it - has become more widespread in the Champagne region. In exceptionally good years, some houses are now producing vintage wines profiling a single year's harvest, or single-vineyard wines made from a particularly outstanding parcel. But not without controversy: at the Champagne Information Bureau's annual tasting in London in March, some winemakers wrote off the single-vintage mono-parcel champagnes as a ploy to market novelties as luxuries...
Even Olivier Krug, director of the house, admits that the single-vineyard Clos d'Ambonnay is one of "the simplest Krug wines to produce." As far as I am concerned, though, it is simply stunning, and I find myself thinking of every possible excuse to make a toast. Here's to Tuesday afternoons...
...That doesn't impress locals. "Many of these vineyard owners are committed to production and investment plans spanning 20 or 30 years," says a member of the regional wine sector, who asked not to be named due to the "vivid tension" the situation has created. "These aren't operations that can change strategy or cut production overnight...