NV Krug Grande Cuvée 170th Edition
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Tasting Notes
The NV Grande Cuvée 170ème Edition, (2014 base vintage) is rich, ample and explosive. Wonderfully fresh and vibrant, the 170 offers an exotic mélange of dried orchard fruit, pear, spice and crushed flowers. Chef de Caves Eric Lebel was not especially excited about 2014 when I saw him a few months after the harvest, as yields in Pinot Noir and Meunier were adversely affected. Perhaps for that reason the 170 contains more reserve wines than most editions. Regardless, the Krug team crafted an absolutely brilliant Grande Cuvée. The blend is 51% Pinot Noir, 38% Chardonnay and 11% Meunier, vintages 2014 through 1998. Disgorged: Autumn 2021. Krug ID: 421062.
Critic Scores
Average Score
James Suckling
William Kelley, Wine Advocate
More reviews and scores
This is full-bodied and very rich with lots of dried and fresh lemons with lemon curd and delicate Italian croissant. Fine and flavorful. Drink or hold.
From vintages spanning from 1998 to 2014, the NV Champagne Grande Cuvee 170eme Edition is decadent and nuanced, with a rounded perfume of toasted brioche, lemon curd, and honeydew melon. Ripe yellow orchard fruits fill the palate with nectarine, fresh grapefruit pith, and a core of acidity. This is showing wonderfully now, although it still has the tension to go for the next 20 years.
Krug's NV Grande Cuvée 170ème Édition is based on the 2014 vintage, complemented by some 45% reserve wines dating back to 1998, with the house drawing on, among many others, 2013 for structure and 2012 and 2003 for generosity. Opening in the glass with aromas of pastry cream, dried fruits, pear, warm spices, freshly baked bread and vanilla pod, it's medium to full-bodied, pillowy and fine-boned, with excellent concentration, racy acids and a precise, chiseled profile. But if the latter adjective could be applied to the 2013-base 169ème édition equally felicitously, the 2014-base 170ème is more giving and less tightly wound out of the gates and will offer more demonstrative drinking young.
About the producer
Krug is a remarkable Champagne House which only makes prestige cuvées. The wines – with their distinctive rich, complex, oxidative style – are some of the region’s best.