The year’s best-value Champagne

published 24 December 2012

NV Chartogne-Taillet, Sainte Anne Brut, Champagne, France (£25, The Wine Society, 01438-741177).

I have tried to add up how many NV Champagnes I have tasted this year, but the paper mountain is too high to scale. Suffice to say that in this crowded category there are wines that range from 12 or so pounds a bottle, in the foothills (without exception these are idiotic Christmas discounts on shockingly poor wine), to the great Krug Grande Cuve at the peak still a wine with enough grandiose flavours and soaring aromatics to shock you, priced at around £115.

But if you want to drink sensational Champagne, at the right price, and I balk at spending over £25 for party Champs, then this is the finest bottle by a mile andit will amaze even the most pompous of Champagne bores, too!

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Get your order in this morning and make sure that you cover off your Christmas and New Year purchases because Christophe Chartogne's tiny estate has rewarded us with one of the most exotic, graceful, enchanting and silky-smooth Champagnes imaginable. With a 50% chardonnay, 40% pinot noir, 10% pinot meunier recipe, and using a touch of oak, this is categorically the finest value Champagne of the year.

Matthew Jukes is a winner of the International Wine & Spirit Competition's Communicator of the Year (www.matthewjukes.com).

Matthew Jukes has worked in the UK wine business for well over three decades and during this time has written 14 wine books.

Matthew regularly lectures, judges, speaks at wine conferences and runs masterclass tastings for both corporate and private clients all over the world. Matthew is also the creator of his ground-breaking initiative, the One Day Wine School, an indulgent day of tasting and learning first performed in 2006.

He has been the MoneyWeek wine correspondent since 2006 and has written a weekly column for the Daily Mail’s Weekend Magazine since 1999. His four highly-acclaimed, annual wine reports – the Burgundy En Primeur Report, the Bordeaux En Primeur Report, the Piemonte Report and the 100 Best Australian Wines – are published on his website, www.matthewjukes.com.

Matthew is one of the world’s leading experts on Australian wine and, with Brisbane-based wine writer Tyson Stelzer, runs an annual competition in Australia to find ‘The Great Australian Red’. He was made Honorary Australian of the Year in the UK at the 2012 Australia Day Foundation Gala dinner.

Matthew is a winner of the International Wine and Spirit Competition's Communicator of the Year Trophy. His thoughts, recommendations and tastings notes are followed very closely by the wine world at large.