Champagne 2008: A ‘miracle year’?

Is the 2008 vintage in Champagne the greatest ever? 2002 might have something to say about it, but there’s no doubt that ’08 is genuinely superlative. In recent months, I’ve tasted latest-release 2008 offerings from the likes of Amour de Deutz, Billecart-Salmon, Bollinger’s La Grande Année, Cristal, Dom Pérignon and Pol Roger’s Cuvée Sir Winston Churchill. All are utterly mesmerising.

To my palate, they possess so many positives: freshness, charm, purity of fruit, complexity, salinity, precision, balance and length. They are also seductively approachable now. Equally, there’s little doubt that the 2008s will develop and broaden with style and grace.The vintage itself started somewhat inauspiciously. ‘We had spring frosts, followed by hail. July was cold and rainy’, says Gilles Descôtes, cellarmaster at Bollinger, at the 2008 La Grande Année launch at the Ledbury in London. ‘August wasn’t much better: dry but cold.’But then it changed completely. ‘We began picking on 6 September and didn’t finish until the beginning of October.’ At the Dom Pérignon Masterclass at the Decanter Fine Wine Encounter last November, Richard Geoffroy said this ripening period was the longest on record. ‘This is what transformed 2008 into Champagne’s miracle year.’Roederer’s Jean-Baptiste Lécaillon is just as effusive, describing 2008 as the ‘Let it Be’ vintage. He’s in no doubt that it’s his best ever Cristal – no mean feat when you consider some of its older siblings.Like many, Lécaillon compared harvest conditions to 1996: ‘In 2008, we learned a lot of lessons from 1996.’ For instance, he delayed picking and put some Pinot Noir parcels through the malolactic to soften their acidity. He also gave the wine more time on lees to build texture.

Eleven years on, not every house has shown its 2008 hand. For instance, Krug and Taittinger’s Comtes de Champagne are still keeping their powder dry.

However, you don’t have to drink prestige cuvée fizz to get a serious taste for this fabulous year. Maisons and growers such as AR Lenoble, Charles Heidsieck, Laurent-Perrier, Moët, Pol Roger and others have produced excellent vintage versions at much lower prices.

My advice to novices and aficionados alike is blindingly simple: buy as many of these miraculous wines as you can.

This column first appeared in the July 2019 issue of Decanter.

2008 Champagnes, tasted by our experts: