Complex and very inviting nose of buttered bread, apricots, orange fruit, crushed chalk and salted almonds. Lovely texture and balance, with layers of fresh salinity and minerality. Medium-bodied. Elegant and classy. Grand Cru fruit. 50% chardonnay and 50% pinot noir. Drink now or hold.

I have been a big fan of Taittinger’s “Prélude” Grand Cru bottling since its inception, and have quite a few bottles happily aging in my cellar. As this is a cuvée that is built for a long and graceful life in the cellar, I do wish the team at Taittinger would start marking at least the date of disgorgement on the back label, as I try to give my bottles at least five years of bottle age before I start drinking them, and if I do not remember to mark when I bought them before they go down in the cellar, they become a bit of a mystery as to their relative age. In any case, the bottling is a fifty-fifty blend of chardonnay and pinot noir, all sourced from grand cru villages on the Montagne de Reims and the Côte des Blancs. The wine is aged sur latte at least five years prior to disgorgement, so I suspect the current release is from the base year of 2014. It is an exceptional young wine, offering up a precise and complex nose of apple, white peach, clementine, fresh-baked bread, a beautiful base of chalky minerality, gentle smokiness and a delicately floral topnote. On the palate the wine is full-bodied, focused and nicely structured, with an excellent girdle of acidity, a rock solid core, excellent mineral drive, refined mousse and a long, nascently complex and beautifully balanced finish. This is approachable now, but five years down the road is when the fireworks are really going to start!

Equal parts Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, the NV Champagne Grand Crus Prelude Brut is based on the 2017 vintage and comes from the villages of Ambonnay and Bouzy for the Pinot Noir and Mesnil-sur-Oger and Chouilly for the Chardonnay. The same release that I tasted last year, it’s developing nicely and harmonizing, with aromas of toasted almond, lemon custard, ripe orchard fruit, and fresh chalky earth. Filling the palate, it’s full-bodied and powerful, with a driving texture of citrus oils and a long, savory, mineral-toned finish. It displays a nice balance between its ripe fruit and its mineral tone. Drink 2023-2033. 9 grams per liter of dosage. - Audrey Frick

Vintage quality, with five years of ageing on lees. Clean and impeccably-shaped, the latest release of Prélude combines intense lemon oil and fleshy peach Chardonnay with sweet strawberry Pinot, crystal-clear and long, rounded out by creamy-textured almond richness and showing promise for further ageing. A hidden gem in the Taittinger portfolio. 50% Pinot Noir and 50% Chardonnay grands crus.

The newest release of Taittinger’s NV Prélude Grands Crus, drawn entirely from the 2017 vintage and disgorged in June 2024 with a dosage of nine grams per liter, offers up aromas of toasted bread, pear, peach and almond paste, subtly framed by gentle reduction. Medium- to full-bodied, muscular and broad-shouldered, the wine possesses a rich core of fruit yet remains lively structured around racy acids, culminating in an enveloping finish. Sourced—as ever—from six grand cru villages (Mailly-Champagne, Verzenay, Ambonnay, Avize, Le Mesnil-sur-Oger and Oger), it is a 50/50 blend of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, though there is no question that 2017 favored Chardonnay, as red varieties faced considerable disease pressure throughout the region. - Kristaps Karklins

Well-honed acidity defines rich notes of smoked hazelnut, pear tarte Tatin, lemon meringue and mineral, a focused profile set on the satinlike mousse. Lingering and spiced on the racy finish. Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. Drink now. - AN