Cork popped on 'oldest' shipwrecked champagne

[November 17, 2010]  MARIEHAMN, Finland (AP) -- They say a good wine matures with age. But does champagne lose its sparkle after nearly two centuries under water?

A handful of samplers were to find out on Wednesday.

Divers who salvaged the vintage bubbly from a shipwreck in the Baltic Sea were presenting more details about the spectacular find, billed as the world's oldest drinkable champagne. They also invited about 20 people to taste the vintage bubbly.

Some 30 bottles were found in the shipwreck discovered in July near the Aland Islands, between Sweden and Finland. The divers originally said the bottles were believed to be from the 1780s but experts later dated the champagne to the early 19th century.

At the time they couldn't identify the brands because the bottles had no labels. But champagne house Veuve Clicquot said in a statement Wednesday that experts analyzing the branding of the corks "were able to identify with absolute certainty" that three of the bottles were Veuve Clicquot.

Other bottles examined were attributed to the now defunct champagne house Juglar, it said.

Francois Hautekeur, of Veuve Clicquot's winemaking team, described the champagne as "a toasted, zesty nose with hints of coffee, and a very agreeable taste with accents of flowers and lime-tree."

The champagne house, founded in 1772, said the branding inside the cork featured a comet, added to pay tribute to one that crossed the skies of Champagne in 1811 "and was rumored to be the cause of a harvest of remarkable quality."

Veuve Clicquot said it used the Baltic route for shipments to the imperial court of Russia.

French champagne house Perrier-Jouet, a subsidiary of Pernod Ricard, has earlier stated that their vintage from 1825 is the oldest recorded champagne still in existence.

[Associated Press; By LOUISE NORDSTROM]

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