Very mature but still vibrant with good intensity and grip. Mature flavors of smoky nuts, minerals, caramel and brown spices grace the palate and the finish is very complex. Time to drink up!
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In fine condition with great precision and perfect intensity for a 33-year old bottle of Champagne. Very fine bubbles with a great, complex finish with notes of steely copper minerals and hints of butterscotch and caramel. Lovely and very ready.
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The best 88 Champagnes from 1988 Part 3/3 Prestige Cuvees from Magnum (L'assiette champenois): Magnum, not blindly Nosewiese it reminds me to an old dry Riesling. Not the typical roasted nuts, vanilla and toast notes. Blindly not detectable. Later some yuzu and tea leaves. Still dominated from the primary notes. Incredible concentration and in this bottle size at least 20 more years ahead. The winner in this huge flight. 98
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Very comparable to the 12/28 note. The nose is improving a lot with air but this is still a little bit darker and more advanced than you’d hope for in a good ‘88. Honeyed cereal grains on the nose. Browning orchard fruit with cinnamon and clove spice. Putting on more orange citrus. Palate still has that copper note. Think some kind of orange pasty. 91-92.
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Impressive. Deep golden color and soft mousse. After the first sip, I thought it might be a little tired. But the faintest hint of oxidative notes blew off and left caramel-y, bready notes with plenty of acidity. Fruit was very much in the background but still present. Really well balanced and terrific all around.
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Colour is medium gold. The nose is honey, toffee, and butterscotch, and fairly oxidative. Freshness picks up with more air, although initially this seems like a more advanced bottle than the last. More brioche, more tangerine, and less in the way of green apple. Savoury. Mild copper metallics. Tropical fruit, overripe mango. Textured caramel and rich flavours on the mid palate but the finish is slightly clipped. Imagine there is considerable bottle variation with these. Still very good, mature and delicious, but hope the next is a little brighter.
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Highly nuanced bottle. Carmel and toffee with some toast and butterscotch. Iodine and sea shells as well. Hints of primary flavors like yeast and bread but these have given way to the secondary and more nuanced flavors. A wonderful combination. Still has a lot of good energy.
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Five Decades of Leroy (Charlie Bird): Soft caramel and buttered nose with green apple and trace salinity. Straddling a beautiful line that is nicely summed up by green caramel apple. On the palate good effervescence drives developed pear fruit. Good acid still. Somewhat oxidative towards the end. Really nice brioche. Consistently love CDC at all ages and vintages, and have been looking for an '88 for a while now. Thank you Tim!
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Mark's bottle. Quite reduced when first opened, then it freshened up and displayed mature notes of bruised apple and oxidation. Enjoyable but seems older than it is. Lacks freshness.
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Dinner at Andrew's place: Served non-blind. Golden colour, a small bead. A bouquet of toffee apple, smoke, almond croissant, with oxidative notes and yeasty autolysis. Slightly lactic fragrances, a touch of Époisses. Drinking well as a mature Champagne. Creamy and lactic with grapefruit and other citrus, toffee and chalky minerals. Quite nuanced and layered. Lovely texture and racy acidity. Fully mature but does not look like it is in danger of falling over soon.
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The '88 CdC showed vibrant straw color with little in the way of visible effervescence. On the nose, warm honey, chalkiness and a remarkable whiff of fresh croissants. In the mouth, the acid at first seemed a bit out of balance, being more aggressive than I liked, and it seemed a bit tired, fraying at the edges. We agreed a few degrees colder would help (it had traveled to the restaurant), so into an ice bucket it went, while we sipped something else. After about 20 minutes, we revisited, and found the temperature much more friendly to this bottle - a delicate yet firm structure was fleshed out with more savory pastry notes, and the taste of cooked apples and walnuts with hints of dark caramelized sugars. There was some oxidation, perhaps a bit more than would have been ideal, and the finish never quite panned out completed, but overall it was a very enjoyable example of medium weight mature.
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Champagne BYO (@ Terkel): Crazy acidity with both green and brown apples. A touch of hazelnuts and caramel. Lots of complexity and a really well stored bottle. Impressive wine.
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Verticale Comtes de Champagne Taittinger (Palais Brongniart, Paris, France): Robe d'or foncé. Nez de cire et de torréfaction, au palais viennent les agrumes rôtis, quelques notes amères, la matière tapisse le palais et les agrumes s'imposent en finale après quelques minutes dans le verre. Impressionnant de longévité.
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Bel Air Bacchanal (Los Angeles, California): A beautiful bouquet of butter, honey, yeast, cheese and chalk. Deep and mature, this weightless, balanced 1988 features nuttiness, brioche, chalky minerality and yellow fruits. Well integrated acidity frames the very slightly off-dry palate with a great sense of poise.
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Butter, cheese, chalk, honey, and nuts on the nose. Oh so delightful. Irresistible palate to match. The day after tasting this wine, bpj87 and I purchased the last remaining bottle from the same source. Just a fantastic mature champagne.
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This seemed much more advanced that it should have been so perhaps the bottle wasn't stored properly. Still a nice drink, but not in the same league with the best '88s - Krug, Salon, Cristal, etc.
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Bob C. guessed this was a '76 and I would have agreed if I had not known better. It's sound, but has only a modest mousse and a touch of sherry on the nose which adds complexity in a positive way. Medium full on the palate, as Comtes gets when it ages. I like it a lot as a fully mature champagne, but I can see why some would consider it less enjoyable than a younger vintage. It's my last bottle, so I probably will never see it again.
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Pretty powerful on the nose with caramel, toast, earth, butterscotch and roast nuts. The palate is a contrast to the nose, being youthful and tightly coiled. Long and rich flavour. Probably in a slightly difficult stage between youth and maturity at the moment, it may look even better in a few years time.
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Not nearly as dazzling as the last time (from the same source), but still an outstanding champagne in the very mature phase. Almost no bubbles at all in my impeccable clean Tritan glasses. Interesting nose of over-ripe apples, dried fruits and nuts. Very nice mid palate that's more like a 15 year old white burgundy than a champagne, but since it's all chardonnnay, that's not too surprising. Clean finish of decent persistence. I like my champagne a bit fresher for perfection, though.
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Stupendously good. Opened at the beginning of a (very) fine wine dinner with the Cataldos at Marks Mizner Place. Almost impossible to imagine a more elegant champagne. Perfect as an aperitif, since its beauty is such that it is diminished by any distraction such as mere food. Delicate, yet flavorful; almost sweet from the perfectly poised mature chardonnay, it simply doesn't get much better than this. Not as chalky as an all-Mesnil blancs de blancs so there must be a mixture of grand cru chardonnay site fruit. A wine of extreme finesse and fascination; gentle, not powerful, yet simply beautiful.
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The first champagne to grace my new Orrefors Harmony "red wine" glasses. Whether it's the wine or the glassware I cannot yet tell, but this one had almost no bubbles, just a slight prickle on the tongue. Not to worry though, the white, actually lightly golden, wine in it was a classically lovely, delicate but not puerile example of mature Comtes. Complex flavors centering on buttery brioche are delightful and satisfying. The finish had that champagne tang that keeps the wine fresh almost regardless of age. To drink and enjoy soon while it's "still" champagne.
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This is about as good as it gets. Beautiful mid-gold color with active but gentle stream of tiny bubbles. Intense aroma (in champagne terms) of caramel and vanilla with a hint of hazelnut and orange peel, most of which is detectable on the palate. Velvety texture, lovely finish. No deterioration after being opened for an hour and a half. Comtes is an excellent champagne when young, but an exquisite one when 18 years old.
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This is the reason to age champagne. This bottle was part of a recent auction purchase from AMC, and the previous owner clearly took good care of it. Just a lazy stream of tiny bubbles and a mild prickle on the tongue, so this drink is more wine than champagne. Extraordinary complex aromas and flavors inclluding overcooked apples, cinnnamon, nutmeg, walnuts and citrus. But it's not dessert and the finish is emphatically tangy butterscotch. No change in the glass for over two hours. Amazing complexity and interest. Dramatically different than young Comtes which is delicious in a different way. Great match for the seared diver scallops with linguine in a lobster stock reduction. To drink now.
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High End Champagne Tasting (Lafayette, Ca.): Very few small bubbles formed a mousse, old nose, sweatsox, suggests corkiness, good acid, medium fruit and medium finish. My #6 of 6.
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8 Champagnes Tasted for the Holiday Season (Lafayette, Ca.): Hints of cardboard throughout the night, very creamy and rich on the palate, opened nicely, turned slightly austere with honey as the tasting went on, slightly short finish. Slightly corked but most failed to notice this. My #3 of 8 and Group #5. $59.97.
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10/22/2022 - dream Likes this wine: 93 Points
Very mature but still vibrant with good intensity and grip. Mature flavors of smoky nuts, minerals, caramel and brown spices grace the palate and the finish is very complex. Time to drink up!
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6/15/2021 - dream Likes this wine: 93 Points
In fine condition with great precision and perfect intensity for a 33-year old bottle of Champagne. Very fine bubbles with a great, complex finish with notes of steely copper minerals and hints of butterscotch and caramel. Lovely and very ready.
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1/23/2021 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine: 93 Points
I've drunk this wine about 5 times. It was a great champagne. I am saying "it was" because the last bottle had clearly passed his peak.
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8/6/2019 - dmalcolm wrote:
Deep golden coloured with faint mousse. Heavily oxidized and a little tired, this bottle showed 10 years older than one would expect from an '88.
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10/14/2018 - aquacongas Likes this wine: 98 Points
The best 88 Champagnes from 1988 Part 3/3 Prestige Cuvees from Magnum (L'assiette champenois): Magnum, not blindly
Nosewiese it reminds me to an old dry Riesling. Not the typical roasted nuts, vanilla and toast notes. Blindly not detectable. Later some yuzu and tea leaves. Still dominated from the primary notes. Incredible concentration and in this bottle size at least 20 more years ahead. The winner in this huge flight. 98
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8/14/2018 - The Vines That Bind wrote: 92 Points
Very comparable to the 12/28 note. The nose is improving a lot with air but this is still a little bit darker and more advanced than you’d hope for in a good ‘88. Honeyed cereal grains on the nose. Browning orchard fruit with cinnamon and clove spice. Putting on more orange citrus. Palate still has that copper note. Think some kind of orange pasty. 91-92.
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4/21/2018 - esh44 wrote:
Impressive. Deep golden color and soft mousse. After the first sip, I thought it might be a little tired. But the faintest hint of oxidative notes blew off and left caramel-y, bready notes with plenty of acidity. Fruit was very much in the background but still present. Really well balanced and terrific all around.
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2/1/2018 - RayOB wrote: flawed
Drank in HK
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12/28/2017 - The Vines That Bind wrote: 92 Points
Colour is medium gold. The nose is honey, toffee, and butterscotch, and fairly oxidative. Freshness picks up with more air, although initially this seems like a more advanced bottle than the last. More brioche, more tangerine, and less in the way of green apple. Savoury. Mild copper metallics. Tropical fruit, overripe mango. Textured caramel and rich flavours on the mid palate but the finish is slightly clipped. Imagine there is considerable bottle variation with these. Still very good, mature and delicious, but hope the next is a little brighter.
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9/28/2017 - Kemo Sabe Likes this wine: 94 Points
Highly nuanced bottle. Carmel and toffee with some toast and butterscotch. Iodine and sea shells as well. Hints of primary flavors like yeast and bread but these have given way to the secondary and more nuanced flavors. A wonderful combination. Still has a lot of good energy.
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9/27/2017 - The Vines That Bind wrote: 94 Points
Five Decades of Leroy (Charlie Bird): Soft caramel and buttered nose with green apple and trace salinity. Straddling a beautiful line that is nicely summed up by green caramel apple. On the palate good effervescence drives developed pear fruit. Good acid still. Somewhat oxidative towards the end. Really nice brioche. Consistently love CDC at all ages and vintages, and have been looking for an '88 for a while now. Thank you Tim!
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6/28/2017 - sdr Likes this wine: 90 Points
Mark's bottle. Quite reduced when first opened, then it freshened up and displayed mature notes of bruised apple and oxidation. Enjoyable but seems older than it is. Lacks freshness.
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1/1/2017 - HowardNZ Likes this wine: 96 Points
Dinner at Andrew's place: Served non-blind. Golden colour, a small bead. A bouquet of toffee apple, smoke, almond croissant, with oxidative notes and yeasty autolysis. Slightly lactic fragrances, a touch of Époisses. Drinking well as a mature Champagne. Creamy and lactic with grapefruit and other citrus, toffee and chalky minerals. Quite nuanced and layered. Lovely texture and racy acidity. Fully mature but does not look like it is in danger of falling over soon.
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7/11/2016 - NYC_Maenad wrote:
The '88 CdC showed vibrant straw color with little in the way of visible effervescence. On the nose, warm honey, chalkiness and a remarkable whiff of fresh croissants. In the mouth, the acid at first seemed a bit out of balance, being more aggressive than I liked, and it seemed a bit tired, fraying at the edges. We agreed a few degrees colder would help (it had traveled to the restaurant), so into an ice bucket it went, while we sipped something else. After about 20 minutes, we revisited, and found the temperature much more friendly to this bottle - a delicate yet firm structure was fleshed out with more savory pastry notes, and the taste of cooked apples and walnuts with hints of dark caramelized sugars. There was some oxidation, perhaps a bit more than would have been ideal, and the finish never quite panned out completed, but overall it was a very enjoyable example of medium weight mature.
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5/28/2016 - canan wrote: 95 Points
Champagne BYO (@ Terkel): Crazy acidity with both green and brown apples. A touch of hazelnuts and caramel.
Lots of complexity and a really well stored bottle. Impressive wine.
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1/1/2016 - Zitan wrote:
This one was dead as nails, sadly - flat, oxidized, nose of sushi! :) Happy New Year!
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12/27/2015 - Loekkeboe Likes this wine:
Apple, bread dough and a bit of oxidation on the nose. Golden colour. Creamy apple flavours.
Very nice.
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6/14/2015 - TBAFB wrote: flawed
Tired bottle. Faded, caramelised and with a hint of oxidation.
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2/10/2015 - Topper wrote: flawed
Blowout BYO (Cambridge, MA): Flawed/Oxidized. This was the only failure of the evening. Good to get it over with quickly.
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6/21/2013 - derrickhsu wrote: 96 Points
Honey, Sweet, buttery nutty
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5/25/2013 - stadler Likes this wine:
Verticale Comtes de Champagne Taittinger (Palais Brongniart, Paris, France): Robe d'or foncé. Nez de cire et de torréfaction, au palais viennent les agrumes rôtis, quelques notes amères, la matière tapisse le palais et les agrumes s'imposent en finale après quelques minutes dans le verre. Impressionnant de longévité.
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3/23/2013 - bpj87 Likes this wine: 95 Points
Los Angeles "Bucket List" Offline (Los Angeles, California): Slightly better than my last bottle. In comparison to the '88 Krug, this is marked by higher acidity, more tertiary character, and wonderful chalkiness.
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1/5/2013 - bpj87 Likes this wine: 94 Points
Bel Air Bacchanal (Los Angeles, California): A beautiful bouquet of butter, honey, yeast, cheese and chalk. Deep and mature, this weightless, balanced 1988 features nuttiness, brioche, chalky minerality and yellow fruits. Well integrated acidity frames the very slightly off-dry palate with a great sense of poise.
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1/4/2013 - mjg87 wrote: 95 Points
Butter, cheese, chalk, honey, and nuts on the nose. Oh so delightful. Irresistible palate to match. The day after tasting this wine, bpj87 and I purchased the last remaining bottle from the same source. Just a fantastic mature champagne.
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5/24/2011 - gfilgueiras wrote: 97 Points
Wonderful champagne!!!
23 yrs and perfect shape.
Caramelized pecans, roared caramel, vanila and finishing with orange peel.
Great experience !!!!
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3/8/2008 - 60ouvrees wrote:
This seemed much more advanced that it should have been so perhaps the bottle wasn't stored properly. Still a nice drink, but not in the same league with the best '88s - Krug, Salon, Cristal, etc.
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6/23/2007 - sdr wrote: 90 Points
Bob C. guessed this was a '76 and I would have agreed if I had not known better. It's sound, but has only a modest mousse and a touch of sherry on the nose which adds complexity in a positive way. Medium full on the palate, as Comtes gets when it ages. I like it a lot as a fully mature champagne, but I can see why some would consider it less enjoyable than a younger vintage. It's my last bottle, so I probably will never see it again.
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5/19/2007 - CamWheeler wrote: 92 Points
Pretty powerful on the nose with caramel, toast, earth, butterscotch and roast nuts. The palate is a contrast to the nose, being youthful and tightly coiled. Long and rich flavour. Probably in a slightly difficult stage between youth and maturity at the moment, it may look even better in a few years time.
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11/11/2006 - sdr wrote: 91 Points
Not nearly as dazzling as the last time (from the same source), but still an outstanding champagne in the very mature phase. Almost no bubbles at all in my impeccable clean Tritan glasses. Interesting nose of over-ripe apples, dried fruits and nuts. Very nice mid palate that's more like a 15 year old white burgundy than a champagne, but since it's all chardonnnay, that's not too surprising. Clean finish of decent persistence. I like my champagne a bit fresher for perfection, though.
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5/13/2006 - sdr wrote: 98 Points
Stupendously good. Opened at the beginning of a (very) fine wine dinner with the Cataldos at Marks Mizner Place. Almost impossible to imagine a more elegant champagne. Perfect as an aperitif, since its beauty is such that it is diminished by any distraction such as mere food. Delicate, yet flavorful; almost sweet from the perfectly poised mature chardonnay, it simply doesn't get much better than this. Not as chalky as an all-Mesnil blancs de blancs so there must be a mixture of grand cru chardonnay site fruit. A wine of extreme finesse and fascination; gentle, not powerful, yet simply beautiful.
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2/18/2006 - sdr wrote: 93 Points
The first champagne to grace my new Orrefors Harmony "red wine" glasses. Whether it's the wine or the glassware I cannot yet tell, but this one had almost no bubbles, just a slight prickle on the tongue. Not to worry though, the white, actually lightly golden, wine in it was a classically lovely, delicate but not puerile example of mature Comtes. Complex flavors centering on buttery brioche are delightful and satisfying. The finish had that champagne tang that keeps the wine fresh almost regardless of age. To drink and enjoy soon while it's "still" champagne.
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1/8/2006 - sdr wrote: 97 Points
This is about as good as it gets. Beautiful mid-gold color with active but gentle stream of tiny bubbles. Intense aroma (in champagne terms) of caramel and vanilla with a hint of hazelnut and orange peel, most of which is detectable on the palate. Velvety texture, lovely finish. No deterioration after being opened for an hour and a half. Comtes is an excellent champagne when young, but an exquisite one when 18 years old.
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4/16/2005 - sdr wrote: 96 Points
This is the reason to age champagne. This bottle was part of a recent auction purchase from AMC, and the previous owner clearly took good care of it. Just a lazy stream of tiny bubbles and a mild prickle on the tongue, so this drink is more wine than champagne. Extraordinary complex aromas and flavors inclluding overcooked apples, cinnnamon, nutmeg, walnuts and citrus. But it's not dessert and the finish is emphatically tangy butterscotch. No change in the glass for over two hours. Amazing complexity and interest. Dramatically different than young Comtes which is delicious in a different way. Great match for the seared diver scallops with linguine in a lobster stock reduction. To drink now.
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1/1/2001 - buckeye76 wrote: 95 Points
RICH YEASTY FRUIT IN THE NOSE AND FLAVOR JUST KEPT GOING AND GOING. FLAVOR EXPLODED IN THE MOUTH. MEDIUM TO LONG FINISH.
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12/3/1998 - bestdamncab Likes this wine: 84 Points
High End Champagne Tasting (Lafayette, Ca.): Very few small bubbles formed a mousse, old nose, sweatsox, suggests corkiness, good acid, medium fruit and medium finish. My #6 of 6.
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11/29/1995 - bestdamncab Likes this wine: 93 Points
8 Champagnes Tasted for the Holiday Season (Lafayette, Ca.): Hints of cardboard throughout the night, very creamy and rich on the palate, opened nicely, turned slightly austere with honey as the tasting went on, slightly short finish. Slightly corked but most failed to notice this. My #3 of 8 and Group #5. $59.97.
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