Louis Roederer Collection 241 NV (1.5L)

94 JM 

In magnum format. The Collection 241 was only released in large format (magnum and above) and aged an extra year to allow a side-by-side release with the 2017-based Collection in bottle. In the three years since its release, the compact, reductive aspect has begun to soften. Chock-full of minerality, the tangerine-esque fruit crackles with energy. Massively long and finely poised, the toastiness is building on nose and palate, yet this remains the slenderest of all the collection releases. One feels the vintage in overall structure, the aromatic nuances, and mineral freshness are all from the reserve wines. Very good indeed! Statistics: 40% Chardonnay, 18% Meunier, and 42% Pinot Noir. 56% 2016 vintage, 34% Perpetual Reserve (2012-2015), and 10% Reserve wines (2011-2015, aged in oak). Disgorged in spring 2021 with a dosage of 8g/l. Drink from 2024-2030. Tasted: January 2024. - Steven Prichard for Jasper Morris' Inside Burgundy

2016, the base wine for Collection 241, was characterised by particularly varied weather conditions which proved good for the quality of the grapes. After what was a cold, wet spring, summer got off to a late start and was warm and dry with a heatwave in late August. The weather was dry and sunny for the harvest which resulted in excellent ripeness in the grapes. These dry, sunny conditions were ideal for the Pinot noir grapes and gave them their intense fruity character and silky texture. Not to be outdone, the Chardonnays gave us a more classic, well-honed and saline character. The harvest took place from the 15th September to the 1st October 2016. - Louis Roederer

GRAPE VARIETIES: 40% Chardonnay 42% Pinot noir 18% Meunier
241nd BLEND: PERPETUAL RESERVE: 34% (2012, 2013, 2014, 2015) RESERVE WINES AGED IN OAK: 10% (2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015) 2016 VINTAGE: 56%

The NV Collection is a new wine from Roederer that replaces the Brut Premier in the range. The Collection (which now will be numbered by harvest) is a blend of three components: a perpetual reserve done in the classic non-malo Roederer style, reserve wines in oak with a touch of malo, and a base vintage. That blend results in a NV Champagne that offers lovely richness and resonance, with plenty of yellow orchard fruit and floral character. Whereas Brut Premier was typically a focused, nervy wine that, while consistently excellent, also was not always in line with the Roederer house style, the Collection tastes more like a Roederer Champagne in terms of its complexity. Dosage is 8 grams per liter, so lower than the 9 or so that was typical for recent Brut Premier and much lower than the 12-13 that was once customary. The Collection was also bottled with a bit less sugar than the norm, which results in lower atmospheres of pressure in the bottle and silkier texture.

“Brut Premier was created in the late 1970s and 1980s, when we struggled to ripen,” Chef de Caves Jean-Baptiste Lecaillon explained. “It was our way of compensating for lack of ripeness in the field and the variability of quality across vintages. Because of climate change, achieving ripeness is not an issue today. Instead, our challenge is maintaining freshness and precision. For that reason, we decided to re-think our NV and start from a place of positive rather than negative selection.” -Vinous Media