Wine of the week: an enchanting vintage Champagne

published 20 December 2011

2002 Asda Extra Special Vintage Champagne, France (£20.17, reduced to £18.00 until 31 December, Asda).

I have been fortunate enough to be your wine scribe for nearly six years and I have never written up a wine from the hallowed aisles of the great purveyor of popular victuals, Asda. I am now putting this right. As always, at this special time of year, I hunt down the finest value Champagnes for your delectation.

This means wading through oceans of dire fizz and it's not only the supermarkets who churn out the overpriced, underwhelming stuff: the famous houses often do too. As usual, there is a handful of reliable brands that will never let you down (Billecart-Salmon, Bollinger, Gosset, Jacquesson, Pol Roger, Louis Roederer and a host of small growers), but these wines are often dear. So when it comes to party planning, or just some downright excellent value, where on earth do you turn?

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The 2002 vintage was a classic one. I have been banging on about it forever, but most wines have moved on to 2004 and even 2005! This wine is made by Chanoine Frres for Asda and it has spent seven years in the bottle maturing in France. It is definitely the best value Champagne of the year and it thoroughly deserves the Extra Special' moniker. Try to ignore the dull label and concentrate on the contents. For 18 quid, this is a thoroughly enchanting wine.

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.

Wine of the week: an enchanting vintage Champagne

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