Pol Roger's glorious vintage champagne

published 27 March 2009

1999 Pol Roger, Vintage Brut, Champagne, France (from about £45, Berry Bros & Rudd, Majestic, selected Oddbins, Wine Society, and many others).

The annual champagne tasting held at the the Banqueting House in Whitehall last week was a very popular event indeed no surprise there.

The various champagne houses set out their tables around the room, but I headed straight to the vintage table. I then tasted 70-odd wines in an effort to find the best. I relish this challenge each year.

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My favourite producers always come up trumps Billecart-Salmon, Bollinger, Dumangin, Gosset, Alfred Gratien, Henriot, Jacquesson, Larmandier Bernier, Louis Roederer and a few others all looked pristine and splendid in their livery, but when it comes to value for money this wine, from the great house of Pol Roger, was the winner by a very strong margin.

For the same price as a bottle of some other peoples' non-vintage offerings comes this simply delicious and eminently gluggable vintage wine. At ten years old it is drinking perfectly and there is every facet of elegance, finesse and distinction that you might expect.

If you shop around then you might be able to find it for less than 40 quid this is one glorious and affordable luxury that you simply must not live without.

Matthew Jukes is a winner of the International Wine & Spirit Competition's Communicator of the Year

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.