In 2016, the sparkling wine world screeched to a halt when a number of professional blind tastings rocked the very core of Champagne. Headlines read like an “Extra! Extra!” from the 1940s, with my favorite coming from The Drinks Business: “Sacrilege on the streets of Paris this week, as France’s top wine judges rated English sparkling higher than Champagne in a blind tasting.” It’s true: In a blind tasting stacked with top French gourmands, Gusbourne took down Champagne Ayala and Nyetimber throttled Champagne Billecart-Salmon. It had to be a fluke...right? Wrong: Months later, another blind tasting left distinguished critics (Jancis Robinson, Neal Martin, Jamie Goode), and a number of French sommeliers completely slack-jawed. This time around, Gusbourne and three other English estates mopped the floor with—and it pains me to say this—the likes of Taittinger, Bérèche, Pol Roger, Savart, and four other estimable Champagnes.
My point is that English sparkling wine is not a trend or fad—it’s a legitimate category exploding with popularity and quality. They have the same chalky soils, noble grapes, and traditional method, plus, as the region of Champagne warms, more eyes will increasingly lock onto the United Kingdom for their sparkling wine needs. Don’t get me wrong, Champagne isn’t going anywhere just yet, and their top prestige cuvées are still rivaled by none, but it would be a tremendous disservice to ignore England. More specifically, today’s 2015 Gusbourne Brut Reserve, a wine that doesn’t just “mirror” Champagne—it’s been proven to consistently beat it. This marks our very first English sparkling offer, and it’s a long time coming for us which is why we couldn’t be more thrilled to extend this breathtaking gem to you.
Although Gusbourne Estate released their first vintage in 2006, the property itself is loaded with ancient history, and can be traced back to a John de Goosebourne some 610 years ago! It is here in Kent County, on the fringe of South East England, where grape-growing and sparkling wine has skyrocketed over the past couple of decades. Why? For one, climate change and grade-A terroir. It’s rainy and cold in Kent, but a gradual increase in temperatures, plus chalky clay-limestone soils, has created a Shangri-La for Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Meunier destined for sparkling wine production.
For all of Gusbourne’s sprawling vine real estate, intense manual work is carried out and organic fertilizers are applied throughout the growing season. Come harvest, each cluster is picked by hand and heavily sorted prior to arrival at the winery. Therefore, only the finest bunches make it into the press. The pristine, highly acidic juice is then transferred into a combination of stainless steel tanks and oak barrels for primary fermentation. Following, the resulting wine is bottled and manually laid to rest in their cellar. For today’s 2015 Brut Reserve, 36 months of lees aging passed before disgorgement.
The 2015 vintage in Kent was bracingly cold and right in line with the Champagne’s classic growing seasons of yore. As a result, I thought this was a dead-ringer for high-quality Champagne from Montagne de Reims, maybe a 2013 Grand Cru from Verzy or Verzenay. Given a few swirls and minutes to settle in the glass, the wine erupts with extremely finessed notes of yellow and red apple skin, Rainier cherry, baked pear, pineapple, bruised apricot, lemon curd, citrus zest, toasted almonds, brioche, fruitcake, crushed chalk, and a touch of honeysuckle. The vivid palate is soft and richly textured with remarkable acidity, freshness, and tension that serves to enliven each sip. Not only is it already immensely delicious and ready to compete with the titans of Champagne, but it is also fully prepared to continue evolving for another 5-7 years. English sparkling is on the fast track to fame, don’t get left behind!
