From Roederer's cellar to your table

Louis Roederer’s indefatigable chef de cave Jean-Baptiste Lécaillon had a cunning plan, devised in the 1990s soon after he arrived at the family-owned house in 1989. He was frustrated that, because Roederer were not in the habit of keeping back stock in any quantity, it was not possible to demonstrate the ageing potential of their champagnes.

So from the disgorgement date of the 1990 vintage bottling in 1997, he deliberately set aside about a 1,000 bottles and 500 magnums of successive Louis Roederer vintage champagnes to...