NV Hiedsieck Monopole Blue Cap

[Jenise]

Every time I taste a Heidsieck I am fondly reminded of a special British Airways Business Class flight to London when we, on a lark, booked a last minute trip to London with another couple to celebrate a birthday. They had Heidsieck on board, and we drank every drop.

I recently purchased a bunch of Henriot, Deutz, Gosset and this Hiedsieck to make sure we had all celebrations for the next year or three covered. I'd rather own them and age them than buy per occasion.
The Heidsieck always tastes very old-fashioned to me, and I like that about it. Fruity and giving, with a taste that reminds me of Frangelico--toasted hazelnuts and caramel--on the apple fruit. Complex and harmonious. Quite good.

[James Roscoe]

The Hiedseck blue top is always reliable and at $25 - $30 it is well-priced. I prefer the Abele if I can get it, but the Heidseck is an excellent bottle of the true fizz.

[David M. Bueker]

Had a bottle of the Heidsieck about 6 weeks ago, and everyone at the table found it simple and sweet. Most poured it out.

Perhaps it was not representative.

[Jenise]

Simple and sweet? YIKES. Not the bottle we had; hope the bottles I ordered thensforth come from the same batch, not yours.

[James Roscoe]

Had a bottle of the Heidsieck about 6 weeks ago, and everyone at the table found it simple and sweet. Most poured it out.

Perhaps it was not representative.

Heidseck makes a sweet fizz for the American market. It's not the blue top though.

[David M. Bueker]

This bottle was clearly the blue top.

[Jenise]

A problem with an NV is, I guess, that rather than get a multi-vintage blend you could get, say, an unattributed 2003. It's been my experience, though, that though I have sometimes seen some variation from one time and the next, most house's non-vintage brews are fairly consistent, at least stylistically. I was musing on this the other day when considering a Steve Tanzer 90 pt review on one of them, in fact might have been this Heidsieck, wondering how any reviewer could assign points to a non-vintage wine that means anything since the review has virtually no expiration date and may not apply to future versions.

[Jenise]

David, my shipment came and I opened a bottle last night. Ygads--it's sweet! Definitely closer to extra dry than brut, with big simple 7-Up bubbles and almost no mousse. Awful.

How many bottles can I send you?

[Jenise]

And yet another addendum: a bottle on NYE (among a passle of admittedly modest wines) was a standout. Like the first bottle we opened, it pretty much matched Steve Tanzer's review: rich and finer bubbled than the last bottle, with lots of hazelnut and yeasty brioche notes. Seems to be a lot of bottle variation here.