New book from Champagne guru of them all; Richard Juhlin

If you have a Champagne disease, like me – you will most certainly hear the name Richard Juhlin at some stage. If you want to label Champagne expert on a wine journalist on Planet earth – Richard Juhlin is the one. Personally he hates the term Champagne expert, as he finds it pretentious and a narrowing spectrum of the human being behind this title. This is typical for Juhlin and for those I know you have met him several times. His is, despite what people beliefs of luxurious Champagne habits might be, a very humble and down to earth person. He even characterizes himself as a romantic. It seems from reading between the lines of his books, that his alert senses is a vital part of his personality and the reason why his passion shines throughout all of his work.


There is a reason why Juhlin is beyond any competitors on the Champagne field. Few wine experts have solely committed themselves to a single wine or region, like our Swedish friend here, and the database consist of nearly 6.500 tasted Champagnes – a Guinness World Record.

2003, Richard Juhlin participated in the” Spectacle du Monde” tasting, held in Paris. 10 Professional tasters got a simple task – blind guess 50 champagnes. They only thing they where told, was that the bottles where available in France. I am not 100% sure, but I think nr. 2 got 13 out of 50 correct. Richard Juhlin on the other hand, did rather well. His tactic was simple – the easiest first, to build up some confidence. When he had tasted 40 Champagnes, he had nailed all 40 correctly – even Richard was surprised of his own abilities that day. His final result was 43/50 correct – pretty good if you ask me ;-)
No doubt that Richard Juhlin is born with some extraordinary good radar sensors and the leading voice on Champagne. He writes with passion and inspiration and you will get awful thirsty if you start to have a look inside his universe.


His new book is a small guide in pocket format useful to have with you if you just happened to be in the region or just traveling and looking to buy some Champagne. The book is like all other books from Richard Juhlin with beautiful illustrations and nicely organized, so that you can easily search for your favorite champagne, producer or vintage. There are only the actually score, not the full tasting note – you will have to buy 4.000 Champanes book or join his http://www.champagneclub.com/ to get those. Even though this new guide is an update, with 2.500 more tasted wines since 4.000 Champagnes – you won’t get all of the scores. You get an update on the latest vintages and releases and probably those you can still find on the market, and additional you get scores on “Old highlights”. I guess at some stage a new “X.000 Champagnes” book will hit the shelves as his database is constantly growing.

The new Champagne guide also includes Restaurants and Hotel accommodations in Champagne.

So overall, even if I feel rather well updated in the Richard Juhlin universe, and this book is only a supplement for me, I could still see myself and others running around in Champagne with this Benchmark guide in my hand.

For more information http://www.champagneclub.com/

/Thomas