Can a $20 champagne really hold its own against the high-end bottles with posh labels? Join me, Domain Dave, as we uncork the mystery behind Costco’s Kirkland Signature Brut Champagne, crafted by none other than Manuel Janison, a winemaker with roots in the elite grand cru towns of Champagne. Despite its modest price point, this sparkling wine boasts a lineage worthy of the most sophisticated palate. With notes of lemon, apple, and a touch of creaminess, this bubbly not only tantalizes the taste buds but offers a fascinating story of how tradition meets affordability.
Join the tasting journey and discover how Manuel Janison, hailing from a family once associated with luxury titan LVMH, brings his expertise to a champagne that challenges the norm. We’ll explore what makes this bottle not just a bargain but a genuine contender in the world of sparkling wines, discussing its elegant design and comparing it to more renowned brands like GH Mumm’s Grand Cordon Brut Rosé. Whether you’re a champagne enthusiast or simply love a good deal, this episode will expand your horizons on what quality champagne can be at a surprisingly accessible price.
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0:06
hey, it's domain Dave. Again for cheap wine. Fighter calm. Another wine review. This one is a Costco champagne. It's been around for a few years now and it's a real champagne. It's 1999. Neither Aldi or Trader Joe's kept their 1999 price. They're now five to six bucks more expensive. Aldi held the price and this is the what do? We got here the Kirkland Signature Brut Champagne and I got it down as the 2024 edition. I don't know if this is a different wine than last year or the year before. I don't know if they bought a whole bunch at one time to keep the price down and kept on releasing it over time. Or has this been made for them this year? The label's the same, the blend's the same and the winemaker's the same.
Speaker 1:
0:58
It's Manuel Janison. He's a third generation winemaker. He had a champagne house that his grandfather founded in a grand crew town in champagne, and it was uh, since 1923, and jannison was part of the lvhm group or lvmh. I forgot what is. That is a company that has all the finest brands, elite brands in the world. They do Dior, they do Givenchy, they do Marc Jacobs, louis Vuitton and for champagnes they did, for example, dom Perignon and Moet and Chandon Some of the biggest names and this Janison Etville was part of that group. Now they decided to stop selling the Januson wine Manuel Januson's wines and the grapes. The vineyards were in a very elite place. They started selling them off so you can get these grapes now in Moet and Dam. Now I don't think that group has anything to do with this wine. I think they stopped that and I noticed that Manuel Janison has a winery in South America. He's doing other projects, but the champagne part of that seems to be over. They're now growers again, but that's a pretty good provenance for these wines. Somebody who was making wines in that elite brand is making this $20 champagne for Costco.
Speaker 1:
2:39
So you go oh, it's too cheap. It can't be that cheap. What's going wrong here? Nothing, I mean. This guy has been around forever. I mean the uh 23, it's 100 years is that they had the wine we had been around. It's no longer. It's still there, but it's it's growing grapes, not making wine, and he's learned from his father, learned from his grandfather. It's one of those things. So this is legitimate champagne and it's got a backstory that's not too bad.
Speaker 1:
3:05
So let me take a taste. It's bright and crisp. It's really kind of light. On the palate it's lemons and apples and a little bit of creaminess. In the mid palate there was some maybe dried pineapple, a little bit of spice. It's got nice long flavors, crisp and clean. This clean, this is a brute which is a dry wine. There's a couple different levels of dry and brutes. The fruits is dry, that's most close to sweet. Uh, that's champagne's weird, I don't know how to tell you anything else. And this is a legitimate french champagne twenty dollars. It's worth tasting, it's worth buying.
Speaker 1:
3:58
We recently you can check out the Cheap Wine Finder website we did GH Mumm's Grand Cordon Brut Rose, which we found for $25 on sale over the Thanksgiving holidays and that's a wine that sells anywhere from 50 to 65 wines. And that was different than this. That had a balance and it had a few things going for it. But this one doesn't have. But at 20 bucks this thing rocks.
Speaker 1:
4:26
This thing is a really good champagne. It's legitimate and it tastes great and it sips great and it is in a really nice bottle. It's a little bit fatter than the usual champagne bottle. It looks good, made by somebody who was part of a major elite brand and he makes a good bubbly. Now. I'm gonna take a sip.
Speaker 1:
4:52
Now I don't know why it's 20 bucks. I would imagine that he bought the grapes. They've been there for a hundred years. He must have contacts with the growers. Now I don't know why it's 20 bucks. I would imagine that he bought the grapes. They've been there for 100 years. He must have contacts with the growers who you know, sometimes Moet and Shandong, their entry level you know it's $40. Wine uses over 100 vineyards. So you buy a little bit, a little bit of that, and I imagine this guy's got contacts everywhere, so he's got a little bit of grapes here and there.
Speaker 1:
5:22
Another thing is the high-end champagnes and usually, and also in Bordeaux and Napa, the first time they press the grapes, that's the first run, and all the elite high-end wines only use first run wines and then they sell off the rest of it. Is the second pressing that bad? No, not really, but it's they're. They're the best of the best. You know it's. It's not that. Not that you could probably tell the difference of two people made first-run, second-run wines. Would they taste that much different? That's not the point, so it's. So this might be second, might be third, press, uh, grapes. You know a little bit cheaper but for 20 bucks, I'm gonna take another sip, yeah. So I mean, there's there's.
Speaker 1:
6:11
There's ways to make a inexpensive champagne. There's no incentive for most people. You know, you do have Trader Joe's, you do have Aldi, you do have Costco with this one with their Kirkland's signature, and there's a few other places that I've seen have a $20 champagne and they're legit. There's ways to make it cheaper. So is it good? Is the Kirkland Signature Brut Champagne in the year 2024 good? Yeah, it's really good. Should you buy it? Yeah, you should buy it. Is it worthy of New Year's Eve? Yeah, it definitely is. Is it worth buying two bottles for the price of one other champagne? Yeah, that too. So, adios, keep it cheap. Like us where you like your podcasts. This is Domain Dave. Keep it cheap, stay warm and I'll talk to everybody in a couple days. Bye-bye.
