Still f izzing 170 years on, the champagne from a shipwreck

IT’S been aged for a little longer than your average bottle of bubbly – and hasn’t exactly been stored according to the instructions.

But a 170-year-old champagne is leaving experts fizzing with delight after being discovered at the bottom of the ocean.

The 14 cases of wine had spent nearly two centuries lost in the Baltic Sea, the cargo of a ship wrecked off the coast of Finland.

Yet incredibly, connoisseurs last night pronounced that it still has an excellent taste – and has even kept some of its sparkle.

Publishing the first analysis of what is thought to be the world’s oldest and most expensive champagne, the scientists said the bottles had experienced ‘170 years of deep sea ageing in close-to-perfect conditions’.

The champagne – made by the ancient French chateaux of Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin, Heidsieck and Juglar – is worth up to £22,000 a bottle. When 168 bottles were hauled up from a wrecked schooner five years ago, half had leaked and all of the labels had washed off, but markings on the corks linked them back to their original makers in northern France.

And now it has been revealed that 150ft below the sea, at a temperature of between 2C and 4C, with total darkness and high pressure is actually a remarkably good place to store fizz – leaving it perfectly drinkable.

The scientists, led by wine experts from the University of Reims Champagne-Ardenne, analysed one bottle of Veuve Clicquot and one of Juglar, since renamed Jacquesson.

Writing in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, they said: ‘Whereas no bubbles were observed upon pouring, a slight tingling effect was felt upon tasting.’ They concluded that the aroma was ‘empyreumatic, grilled, spicy, smoky, and leathery, together with fruity and floral notes’.