The 15 most expensive rosé Champagnes: 15-6

The rosé wine category is white hot, as is sparkling wine. Combine the two and you’ve got an explosive proposition.

Once derided as little more than fermented strawberry jam, the top rosé Champagnes are now taken seriously as fine wines and almost always command a higher premium than their blanc counterparts.

Rosé Champagne is enjoying a revival, and now accounts for 15% of Champagne shipments in the US and 10.4% in the UK. Since 2005, sales of pink Champagne in the US have risen at a rate of 3.6% each year.

Things are similarly rosy in the UK, where both volume and value sales are significantly up. A healthy 3.2 million bottles of rosé Champagne were shipped to the UK last year, up 13% on 2015.

For leading rosé producer Laurent-Perrier, its sparkling pinks account for over a quarter of its total sales. However, Ruinart was the first house to think pink, producing its inaugural rosé back in 1764.

Rosé Champagne is usually produced by adding of a small amount of red wine – usually Pinot Noir from Bouzy – during blending. Although some houses, like Laurent-Perrier, opt for the saignée method, where colour is attained by ‘bleeding’ it from the skins of Pinot Noir and Meunier grapes.

With its fuller body and more robust, red-fruited flavour profile than blanc Champagne, sommeliers are drawn to rosé’s food matching capabilities.

To celebrate rosé Champagne’s renaissance, we’ve rounded up the 15 most expensive expressions on the market, starting with numbers 15 to 6.

The listed prices are for 75cl bottles including VAT at UK retailers, though in instances where only magnums are available, the magnum price is used.

15: Taittinger Comtes de Champagne Brut Rosé 2006 – £140, Millesima

The jewel in Taittinger’s crown, while may know of its prestige cuvée, Comtes de Champagne, its rosé expression flies under the radar. Only produced in exceptional years, the 2006 rosé is made from 70% Grand Cru Pinot Noir (including 15% still red from Bouzy) and 30% Chardonnay from the Côte des Blancs and Montage de Reims.

5% of the blend spends four months in new oak barrels and it rests for up to a decade on its lees. Winemaker Loïc Dupont believes it bares a close resemblance to the 2002 vintage.

From a tasting perspective, the fizz offers bursts of strawberries, morello cherries, cranberries and blackcurrants on the nose and blackcurrant, orange peel, gingerbread, delicate spice and a hint of pear on the palate, making it a great partner for fruity desserts. A structured wine with crystalline precision, tart tannins and chalky minerality, it has a long, lingering finish.

14: Pommery Cuvée Louise Rosé 2000 – £153.60, Fine & Rare

Pommery & Greno was established in 1836, but it was the savvy, switched-on Jeanne-Alexandrine Louise Pommery, who took over the running of the business in 1858 after the unexpected death of her husband, that solidified Pommery’s name and international reputation. At a time when Champagne was almost sickly sweet, in 1874 Louise launched the first commercially successful brut Champagne.

Named in her honour, the rosé expression of the house’s prestige cuvée, Louise, is a blend of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. The fine fizz boasts aromas of woodland strawberries, vine-ripened peach and a hint of apple. Gentle, charming and graceful on the palate, the fresh expression has a smooth, lingering finish.

13: Perrier-Jouët Belle Epoque Rosé 2006 – £162, Hedonism

Art Nouveau pioneer Emile Gallé created the now famous, impossibly pretty, anemone flower design for Perrier-Jouët’s Belle Epoque prestige cuvée back in 1902. Made only in exceptional harvests, the 2006 vintage is a blend of 50% Chardonnay from Bourons Leroy and Bourons du Midi, 45% Pinot Noir and a 5% dash of Meunier.

Made by cellar master Hervé Deschamps, the house’s most delicate Champagne expression offers an enviable balance of P-J’s signature floral aromas alongside fruity notes, from peonies, strawberries and raspberries to pomegranate, pink grapefruit and a hint of blood orange. Salmon pink and with fine bubbles, it has a long, silky finish and makes a dreamy pairing for shellfish, having spent six years on its lees for added complexity.

12: Krug Rosé NV – £171, D&D Wine

One of the most revered Champagne houses, Krug opts for a multi-vintage blend for its pink rather than making it in exceptional years as a vintage expression. Blended from Pinot Noir, Meunier and Chardonnay from a wide range of years to enhance its complexity and depth, the still Pinot in the blend is fermented on its skins for added colour and to give the fizz its characteristic spice.

Aged for at least five years in the Krug cellars, the wine blends floral, red fruit and patisserie aromas and flavours, from red-berry tart to puff pastry along with hints of honey and citrus fruit. With its floral accents and elegant bubbles, the wine is defined by its finesse and can confidently pair with foie gras, lamb, game, venison and spicy dishes.

Musician Ozark Henry compares the fizz to Bella Bartok’s 2d violin concerto, a demanding, opulent virtuoso piece.

11: Philipponnat Clos de Goisses Juste Rosé 2006 – £216, Fine & Rare

Known for its focus on Pinot Noir, Phillipponat’s Juste Rosé hails from the house’s famed Clos des Goisses vineyard, which is celebrated for the concentration, power and longevity of its wines.

Created by adding a small percentage of still Pinot to its Clos des Goisses blanc, a blend of 63% Pinot Noir and 37% Chardonnay, barrel ageing adds texture and weight to its notes of notes of clementine, blood orange, papaya and hawthorn blossom.

An exceptionally rare and markedly vinous style of rosé, the wine is defined by its aromatic complexity, precise texture, creamy generosity on the palate, and red fruit freshness with a hint of smoke that makes it a great companion for lamb.

10: Veuve Clicquot La Grande Dame Rosé 2006 – £232, Fine & Rare

A tribute to Madame Clicquot, La Grande Dame 2006 rosé is a blend of eight Grands Cru sites: Aÿ, Bouzy, Ambonnay, Verzy and Verzenay for the Pinot Noir (53%); and Avize, Oger and Le Mesnil-sur-Oger for the Chardonnay (47%).

Characterised by its freshness and minerality, the copper-coloured fizz is savoury and dry in style with smoky, peaty aromas and a leafy palate weaved around a firm acid backbone. Saline notes mingle with white raspberries, wild strawberries, morello cherries, candied ginger, sliced almond and a hint of blossom. Tannins are present and correct in this lively sparkler, which offers power and persistence on the palate.

9: Laurent-Perrier Cuvée Alexandra Rosé 2004 – £242.40, Fine & Rare

Best known for its non-vintage rosé, which accounts for over a quarter of the house’s total sales, owner Bernard de Nonancourt created this vintage rosé in 1987 to celebrate his elder daughter Alexandra’s marriage.

A blend of 80% Pinot Noir and 20% Chardonnay, this delicate pink has a fine mousse and aromas of wild strawberries, redcurrant preserve, candied citrus and hints of spice. Characterised by its elegance, finesse and mineral structure, the 2004 vintage is also generous and opulent in style, making it a great partner for langoustines, veal, small game birds and foie gras terrines.

8: Dom Ruinart Rosé 2004, £232, Fine & Rare

Ruinart’s top drop, Dom Ruinart, includes a rosé expression that is as delicate as it is intense. Made from 80% Chardonnay and 20% Pinot Noir vinified as red wine, the wine is made to maximise its aromatic potential.

“One of the most delicately aromatic rosés in existence”, according to its makers, Dom Rosé is known for its mineral, smoky notes and exotic spices, from dried rose petals to blood oranges and mandarins.

Clean and crisp but generous and creamy on the palate, the copper-coloured pink offers ripe, sweet red fruit notes of raspberry, red currant and wild strawberry jelly alongside a mineral taste of wet rock.

7: Louis Roederer Cristal Rosé 2009 – £300, BI Wines and Spirits

The pinnacle of Louis Roederer’s elegant output, its Cristal Rosé is made via the saignée method where colour is attained by ‘bleeding’ it from the Pinot Noir skins.

Made from 55% Pinot Noir and 45% Chardonnay from Grand Cru vineyards in Aÿ, the limestone bedrock and calcareous clay soil enable the vines to attain exceptional fruit maturity complemented by crystalline acidity that encapsulates the Cristal style. The 15% of still Pinot used in the blend is vinified in oak.

The 2009 rosé boasts notes of dark berries, forest fruits and ripe morello cherry on the nose, reminiscent of tangy jam, while the palate is enchantingly silky, delicate and ethereal but retains the signature structure Pinot brings to the blend.

Aged for six years in the Roederer cellars, the onion skin-hued wine pairs well with lobster, foie gras, seared salmon and poached sea trout.

6: Armand de Brignac Rosé NV – £312, Hedonism

The newcomer to the Champagne pack, Armand de Brignac, affectionately known as Ace of Spades, is made by Champagne Cattier in the village of Chigny-les-Roses and is owned by hip-hop mogul Jay Z.

Produced in tiny quantities, its non-vintage rosé is a blend of 50% Pinot Noir, 40% Pinot Meunier, and 10% Chardonnay from the Montagne de Reims, Côte des Blancs, and Vallée de la Marne, and includes 12% of still Pinot in the blend, which is partly aged in oak.

Fresh and full-bodied with aromas of strawberries, blackcurrant, cherries and a hint of smoke, it has a long, silky finish and pairs will with smoked salmon. Its pewter labels are applied by hand.