2006 Champagne Billecart-Salmon, Cuvée Le Clos Saint-Hilaire, Brut

Although it was disgorged in November 2020, Mathieu Roland Billecart has been keen to delay the release. The ageing post disgorgement is just as important as that before it and sometimes overlooked, he maintains. The wine has an attractive Welsh gold colour, a lively and persistent mousse, and seductive aromas of nectarine, greengage and Victoria plum. I even noted a hint of spearmint. The palate maintains a youthful nervosité; behind that generous fruit, including red fruit (cherry mainly), hints of brioche and hazelnut and then an authoritative finish. Great potential.Drink 2022 - 2036Simon Field MW, Decanter.com (October 2021)

Disgorged in November 2020 with two grams per litre dosage, Billecart-Salmon's newly released 2006 Brut Le Clos Saint-Hilaire is showing well, unwinding in the glass with aromas of pear, mirabelle plum, dried fruits, walnuts, bee pollen and spices. Full-bodied, layered and vinous, it's a concentrated, muscular young wine, allying maturing flavours with broad structural shoulders and racy acids and concluding with a long, resonant and slightly mordant finish. From a parcel planted in 1964 and vinified entirely in oak, this is a powerful Champagne of considerable presence that needs some more time on the cork to unwind and round out.Drink 2023 - 2036William Kelley, Wine Advocate (August 2022)

The 2006 Le Clos Saint-Hilaire is fabulous. In this radiant year, the Clos Saint-Hilaire has a touch more mid-palate sweetness and generosity, but that’s a good thing, as it balances some of the more austere leanings that can make young vintages hard to appreciate upon release. Apricot, lemon confit, ginger, graphite, spice and crushed rocks are strands in a gorgeous, captivating tapestry that dazzles right out of the gate. The precision here is just mind-blowing. Billecart's 2006 Clos Saint-Hilaire is a very special Champagne, that much is very clear.Drink 2024 - 2036antonio_galloni, Vinous.com.com (July 2022)

2g/l dosage. Disgorged November 2020. 6,750 bottles. Baked raspberries, salted yellow plums, figs, walnuts, orange zest, mahogany and some toasted vanilla on the nose. Medium to full-bodied with beautifully integrated, very fine bubbles. Dry, with exciting and unique white-pepper and sea-salt notes. Seamless. So harmonious. Salty and spicy clove notes evolve at the end. Amazing precision. Single parcel Pinot Noir, 100% vinified in oak barrels. No malo.Drink or holdjames_suckling, jamessuckling_com (December 2022)

Harvested late September. In barrel until April 2007. Disgorged November 2020. Dosage 2 g/l. To be released in 2022.Rich nose, yeasty and so alive. The oak shows even more as the wine opens up, giving a cedar spice. Such underlying depth and richness with such a surprising mineral and acidic backbone with a verbena note, mandarin – the most citric of the lot. There is a subtler nuttiness here that is almost creamy, like a Belgian chocolate, almost oily on the finish yet with such direction. (AC)Drink 2025 - 2045jancis_robinson_mw MW, JancisRobinson.com (October 2021)