Get Ready to Pop Bottles

Dec 29, 2022

Everyone loves popping bottles on New Years Eve, whether it's Champagne, other sparkling wines, beer or cider. Check out Wes's top choices for the wine side of things.

Gaston Chiquet “Tradition” Brut
40% Meunier, 35% Chardonnay, 25% Pinot Noir

You’d be hard-pressed to find a finer brut Champagne near $50 than this bottling from Gaston Chiquet, which has been botting champagnes from their own estate-grown grapes since 1919—one of the pioneers of “grower” champagne producers using only premier-cru and grand-cru rated vineyards.

Aromas of ripe pear, peach and honey, with a subtle strawberry nuance in the background. The palate offers very good intensity, with fresh orchard fruit and spice cake flavors picking up weight with air. Closes on a vibrant, stony note, with very good clarity and length.

Champagne Louis Roederer, Collection 242
42% Chardonnay, 36% Pinot noir, 22% Meunier

Founded in 1776, Louis Roederer is the quintessential champagne house focused on farming, sourcing, and maintaining a broad cellar of reserve wines. Collection 242 contains a heavy dose of those reserve wines (44%) going back to the 2009 vintage with 10% aged in oak.

The Collection 242 blend is dominated by Chardonnay which was of exceptional quality in the 2017 vintage. The perfectly ripe Chardonnay grapes lend the wine its aromas of ripe, sweet fruit complemented by subtle oaky notes. The palate is rich and ripe with a luxurious texture that coats the palate, the signature of an outstanding Chardonnay. The Pinot noir and Meunier grapes from the Vallée de la Marne complete the wine’s broad, luscious, smooth and juicy character.

Pehu-Simonet “Face Nord Rose” Brut
75% Pinot Noir, 25% Chardonnay

From a tiny producer that makes fewer than 3500 cases per year, you’d expect this Grand Cru Rose to cost substantially more than the ubiquitous lifestyle brand champagnes on the shelves of every store across the country, but it absolutely does not.

About 25% aged in barrel, this is one of the best rose champagnes we’ve had all year showing crushed red berries, spice, chalk and intermingling perfumed floral notes. Absolutely stunning.

If wine is not your thing, or if you're partial to beer or cider, we've got some great stuff for ya there too. Everybody gets to pop bottles!

Weihenstephan Kristall Weissbier
If you need something clean, simple, effervescent and light enough to keep you clear headed, this heavily refined German wheat beer is sparkling, delightful and very manageable.

Son Of Man Sagardo
This Basque style cider via Oregon is dry, funky and bubbly in all the best ways. Its rustic straw coloring looks gorgeous and unique in a glass and the finish is certainly champagne-like.

Drie Fonteinen Oude Gueuze
Drie Fonteinen is a legendary Belgian lambic producer, offering some of the most highly regarded and sought after beer in the world. This blend of 1, 2, and 3 year old spontaneoulsy fermented lambic aged in oak barrels is tart, funky and wildly complex.