Champagne Louis Roederer 'Collection 245' Brut NV

The Collection series takes its number from the total count of harvests since Louis Roederer was founded in 1776 – so Collection 245 is literally the 245th blend in the house's unbroken lineage. Rather than engineering the same flavor profile year after year, Jean-Baptiste Lécaillon designed the Collection to embrace the singularity of each vintage – "almost a vintage, with more twists," as he put it. 

Collection 245 is built on the 2020 base vintage, which makes up 55% of the blend. The cépage is 41% Chardonnay, 35% Pinot Noir, and 24% Pinot Meunier, and rounding out the blend is 35% from a Perpetual Reserve of vintages spanning 2012 through 2019, plus 10% reserve wines aged in oak from select years going back to 2010 with a restrained Brut dosage. This Perpetual Reserve – Roederer's solera-like tank refreshed annually since 2012 – functions as the structural backbone of every Collection, weaving depth and continuity into an otherwise youthful cuvée. Roederer today owns an impressive 240 hectares of vineyards across Champagne's finest villages and has become a pioneer in biodynamic and organic farming – a commitment you can taste in the wine's precision and vibrancy.

On the nose, citron blossom, lemon tart, and lime leaf slowly give way to rising bread dough, fresh ginger, sea spray, and a whiff of coriander seed. On the palate, the wine is elegantly crafted with intense orchard fruit and mineral layers, finishing long and chalky. Flavors of ripe fresh peach, apricot, white flowers, white pepper, and tangerine oil all collide in the glass, yielding to a more open-knit, inviting style with a chalky, elegant texture and a gloriously refined mousse. This is textural and fleshy, laden with vibrant acidity, and buttoned up with a nicely defined, delicately saline finish. And at $69, this elegant little sibling of Cristal is such an easy yes.