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What is a cuvee?
Cuvee is a term used by producers to refer to their finest wines. There are no requirements for such a wine, so each winemaker independently determines the characteristics of the wine that he calls Cuvée. Sometimes cuvée can mean that the wine has been subjected to long aging. The most common sign of Cuvée is limited batches.
Cuvee types
There used to be a generally accepted gradation of cuvee, but today only two categories remain:
Cuvee Prestige
A wine that a particular producer considers to be the best among their wines. It can be distinguished by a successful harvest year, the best wine material or blend, the use of selected whole berries and other signs that the producer will designate.
Cuvee Reservee
Wines made from the best grapes and aged 4-15 years.
Cuvee is always about exclusivity. For such wines, special bottles are most often used, such as, for example, at Chateau Mouton-Rothschild – labels for them were created by Dali, Warhol, Kandinsky.
By the way, the first Cuvee was champagne “Crystal”. It was created in 1876 especially for the Russian Emperor Alexander II from impeccable wine materials.
But the mass production of Cuvée was launched by Moet & Chandon. In 1921, they released the famous Dom Perignon aged 15 years, which is still considered exemplary today. Since then, many producers have begun to use the term Cuvee – it even refers to beer and chocolate.
Relevance: 25.12.2015
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