March 3 (Bloomberg) -- I have finally found a Prestige Cuvee Champagne I really like: 1998 R. Lalou, made by G.H. Mumm. If that sounds snobbish, given that ``Prestiges Cuvees'' are those ultra-expensive Champagnes made in relatively small lots to represent the finest achievement in winemaking by a great house, I don't mean it to be.

My lack of breathless enthusiasm for most of the Prestige Cuvees from makers such as Moet-Chandon, Bollinger, Veuve Clicquot, Roederer and others is based on three objections: First, they are all very expensive, well above $100 a bottle, some $400 and up. Second, they tend to be bone-dry, a fashionable and therefore marketable style, though most lack the aroma and pale sweetness of fruit and flavor I prefer. Third, they are all vintage Champagnes, even though the same houses make a separate line of vintage Champagnes costing far less.

This is a little odd to me, since all these producers make a superior non-vintage line in a consistent house style; they also make more prestigious vintage Champagnes, but only if a vintage is declared particularly fine.

So how much better can a Prestige Cuvee really be? Is it worth three times the price of a non-vintage and double that of a vintage? Such marketing is not unlike Ralph Lauren putting his name on the basic Polo, the very expensive Black Label and the exorbitantly expensive Purple Label lines of men's suits. One has to wonder if the lesser stuff is maybe not all that good.

Only the Best Juice

Champagne producers will insist that the distinction between Prestiges Cuvees and mere vintage Champagne is that while laws permit three pressings of Champagne grapes, the Cuvees use only the best juice from the first pressing, often only the first third, called the ``tete de cuvee.''

The wines then receive a very small ``dosage'' -- a dose of liquid sugar that by tradition adds a desirable light sweetness. They are aged for at least four years before disgorging the sediment in the bottle. As a result, the wines gain maturity and complexity, and time is money, even in the dark, ancient and musty caves of Champagne.

Which brings me back to R. Lalou 1998, the first Prestige Cuvee made under this label since 1985, after nine vintages starting with 1966. The wine is named after Rene Lalou, who as chairman of Mumm restored its luster after the devastation of the vineyards wrought by two world wars.

Mumm, the third-largest Champagne producer, with sales of about 8 million bottles per year (60 percent exported to 100 countries), was bought by Allied Domecq, which let the Cuvee L. Lalou languish. Then, in 2005, the house became part of Pernod Ricard, the No. 2 wine and spirits company in the world.

Studying History

Meanwhile, Mumm's cellar master, Dominique Demarville, and the young winemaker who was to succeed him, Didier Mariotti, had been working in a corner of the cellars studying the old vintages of the Cuvee. When interest revived in producing a Prestige Cuvee, Mariotti believed the 1998 vintage should be the basis of the new line.

Over lunch at Per Se restaurant in New York, Mariotti, 36, told me that while he had access to wines from 12 of the finest Mumm vineyards, he used only 7 for the Cuvee. He wanted to make a ``gastronomical wine,'' not just a Champagne popped for celebratory toasts. Using a low dosage, 6 grams per liter, with 50 percent chardonnay and 50 percent pinot noir grapes, he aged the wines for eight years before disgorging.

``I've waited nine years for this new baby,'' he says, ``and I wanted intensity, freshness and structure.'' The suggested retail price is $160.

As soon as I tasted the wine, with canapes of smoked salmon cones and cheese-filled puff pastry, I knew exactly what he meant about it being a wine to go with food.

Fruit, Aroma

Through the fish and meat courses that followed, the wine had brilliance, plenty of fruit and enormous aroma. I tasted it both well and slightly chilled (in two glasses), and while I found the colder glass brisk and wonderfully sparkling, the warmer glass had lost much of its effervescence. I also had a chance to taste a 1969 R. Lalou, which had not aged well and smelled oddly of varnish.

I asked Mariotti, who is trying to stop smoking (``My palate has apparently adjusted to a pack a day''), if he would advise the consumer to keep the wine for a few years longer.

``Not really,'' he said. ``We make this Champagne to be drunk right away, and we hope to sell all of it within two years. We only make 70,000 to 80,000 bottles. The thing is, if you age it for another two years, it will not be the same as the bottle I age in my cellar. Because of ideal conditions, mine will be more complex than yours.''

Which gave me the perfect excuse to drink as much of the 1998 R. Lalou that afternoon as I wished, while waiting for the 1999 to come along two years from now.

(John Mariani writes on wine for Bloomberg News. The opinions expressed are his own.)

To contact the writer on this story: John Mariani at john@johnmariani.com.

Last Updated: March 3, 2008 00:04 EST