Moët & Chandon Impérial Brut Champagne: The Ultimate Bottle Guide

Maison Moët et Cie (Moët & Company) began in Epernay, within the Champagne region of France, in 1743 by wine trader Claude Moët, Vinepair reports. In 1973, the house officially became Moët & Chandon when the company expanded to California. However, the partnership between the Moët and Chandon families began in 1832. Then, Claude Moët's great-grandson, Victor Moët, partnered with his brother-in-law, Pierre-Gabriel Chandon de Briailles, joining the families together in marriage and business, Saucey adds.

The first bottles of Moët Brut Impérial arrived in 1869 as a realization of the ultimate Moët house style. It is a non-vintage, dry sparkling wine produced by blending multiple vintages to create the iconic representation of the winery's house style. The wine is a blend of fruit grown within the Moët estate and fruit purchased from growers throughout the region. In 1801, the wine became known simply as Moët Impérial in honor of the relationship the Maison had established with Napoléon Bonaparte, setting the stage to be an icon of celebration.

Today's Moët Impérial is a blend of over 100 wines, including upwards of 30% of wine held in reserve. The combination ensures the Champagne will carry the same characteristics and qualities displayed in the previous year. For Moët, the Impérial shows a citrusy, fruit-forward palate, with a crisp, clean texture and a delicate balance.

We tried the Champagne, finding it structured with complexity that melds with approachability. When first pouring a glass of Impérial, it is easy to be struck with how velvety and unctuous the sparkling wine looks, with the golden color of freshly harvested hay. This gives way to a stream of tiny, graceful bubbles racing to the surface in an elegant line.

The blend of 30% pinot noir and pinot meunier, with around 20% chardonnay, creates a fruit-forward palate of zesty citrus and orchard fruit for the sparkler, leading with layers of golden apple, lemon-lime, and honey. The 24 months of aging en triage, or on the lees or yeast strains, lends a bready, yeasty, baked biscuit flavor and creamy texture to the sparkler without creating a weighty palate.

There is a nice balance between fruitiness and mineral earthiness, a nod to the mineral-rich limestone soils of the 320 parcels of land throughout the Champagne region. The finish shows a mélange of orchard and stone fruit with bitter walnut and crushed stone.

Moët recommends chilling in an ice bucket for 15 to 30 minutes before serving and enjoying at a temperature around 45 F. They also suggest adding salt to the ice to keep it cold; we often add a bit of water to the bucket to speed up the process.

Over the years, the best type of wine glass to enjoy your bubbly has changed dramatically. The first official glass of Champagne was the coupe, created in the 1830s in England, reports Advanced Mixology. Throughout the early 20th century, the coupe was the glass of choice, with celebrities sipping from shallow-bowled glasses on and off-screen, the food site adds.

As tastes changed in the late 20th century, the tall, narrow flute glass became more popular. The flute's design ensures that the sparkling effervescence of thousands of tiny bubbles remains concentrated in the vessel. The cocktail site adds that the glass also embraces the delicate aromas of the Champagne that were quickly lost when using a coupe.

Fast-forward to today, where the tear-dropped, tulip-shaped glass, with a round bowl and slightly flared lip, has become the glass of choice for enjoying Champagne. The shape ensures the bubbles remain intact while allowing for more aeration of the sparkler, like famed glass maker Ridel's Dom Pérignon glass.

The world's second most popular wine brand is another Champagne, Moët's sister brand, Veuve Clicquot (via VinePair). Both selections are a part of the parent company LVMH, as are Dom Pérignon and Krug Champagne. The Impérial from Moët and Yellow Label from Veuve Clicquot are both House's most approachable selections.

Each is a non-vintage, brut-style champagne blending reserve and current vintage wines. For Moët, the blend includes upwards of 100 wines; for the Yellow Label, the combination consists of 50-to-60 selections, dominated by pinot noir fruit. Each year the Yellow Label includes at least 50% of the red variety, lending a lip-smacking, fruit-forward note to the sparkling wine.

In tasting the two champagne side by side, the selection from Moët is considerably drier, with a crisp, polished vibrancy that melds with opulence. The Yellow Label is rounder and sweeter on the front palate. It reminds us of Moët's White Star's taste, with candied fruit flavors and a satiny palate.

Both of the selections are delicious but different. If you prefer crisp, refined champagne, the Impérial is for you. The style is also perfect for pairing, especially with anything fried or creamy, as the acidity will cut through the richness. If you prefer a fruit-forward sparkler, the Veuve is for you.

Veuve will set you back a few more dollars than the Moët, with an average price of $67 (via Wine-Searcher).

How to pronounce the beloved bottle has baffled consumers around the globe, with Saturday Night Live skits depicting the linguistic difficulty. Understandably, the articulation can be confusing. You might expect the pronunciation to be similar to escargot or haricot verts, dropping the consonant at the end of the word. So, let's set the record straight on if you enunciate the "t" in Moët, or if it is silent.

Vinepair explains that when pronouncing Moët, the "t" is not silent. Phonetically, the pronunciation is "mow," like you are going to mow your lawn, and "wet," as in the water is wet.

Hamper Emporium explains that though the company is French, the site explains the origin of the surname is Dutch. The Moët family came to France from the Netherlands in the 1400s, Vinepair adds. And though French-born Claude Moët founded the winery, the family kept the traditional Dutch pronunciation of Moët, including a hard "t."

To say the name of the champagne, you would use the traditional French pronunciation of Impérial, articulating each syllable to sound like "umm-peer-e-all."

Police in Padova, Italy, near the sparkling Prosecco region, found 9,000 bottles of fake Moët & Chandon in a shed in 2016. The Guardian reported that police arrested eight counterfeiters working in the countryside shack where they found the fake bottles of sparkling wine. The estimated value of the phony bottles was over $380,000.

The amount is a fraction of the total damage the counterfeiters could have amounted to, as the police found 40,000 Moët & Chandon labels in the shed. If that wine had made it to the open market, its value would have been over $2 million.

Italy's Guardia di Finanza, or financial guard, said it was, "One of the most significant seizures of contraband Champagne in Europe," NBC News reports. Instead of premium champagne, the bottles contained cheap sparkling wine that could have been sold in Italy and abroad.

At least the bottles didn't go to waste. Instead of being destroyed, they were donated to "associations" throughout the Veneto region, The Guardian adds. Let's hope they removed the labels before donating them.

Product placement is a lucrative way for film and television producers can add a little extra income to the production budget. Investopedia defines it as embedded advertising where branded products or services are a part of productions that target large audiences.

Watching the 2013 remake of "The Great Gatsby," it would be easy to assume Moët & Chandon paid millions to the producers as Champagne is featured prominently throughout the film. However, Forbes reports that the Champagne house was surprised by the extensive use of the sparkler as they did not contract the placement.

The decision to use the brand came from the production and costume designer of the film, Catherine Martin. Forbes explains her focus was to keep the movie as historically accurate as possible, selecting the brand based on likely availability. As the Impérial was one of the first exported abroad and of exceptional quality, it seems likely that during the 1920s Gatsby era, the bubbly would have been the brand of choice.

Martin adds Gatsby may have preferred Moët's sister, premium label Dom Pérignon; however, the premium selection did not enter the export market outside of France until the 1930s. Someone with the discerning taste of F. Scott Fitzgerald's character, Jay Gatsby, would select Moët Impérial for his lavish parties at his home on Long Island, New York.