Lovely purity of fruit… light, refreshing but with great intensity and persistence. Very delicate but will no doubt fill out in time with the power of the vintage. Like the 2004 and 2002, this will continue to evolve beautifully for the next decade… that said, it is also delicious to drink now.

– Bordeaux Index Fine Wines & Spirits Merchant

The Chiquet 2005 Brut Special Club – a 70-30 Chardonnay-Pinot blend – exhibits some of the faux-Meunier, greenhouse-like floral and leafy evocations that I noticed in this estate’s 2004 Vintage Brut tasted alongside. There are subtle but mouthwatering notes of noble fungus, even truffle, as well as of nose-tweaking, pungently musky narcissus. Quirky in the way that so many wines of this vintage have become; yet charming in a way that few have, this finishes with soothing but thought-provoking length. If you hold any, I would monitor it carefully. That’s not to suggest I am convinced it will fall apart anytime soon; I simply don’t like to take chances with relatively young wines that exhibit significant raw fungal aromas, even when noble.

Nicolas Chiquet farms more than 50 acres, essentially within the immediate neighborhood of his family’s Dizy base, thus encompassing also illustrious neighbors Ay, Hautvillers, and Mareuil-sur-Ay. Stainless steel vinification with malo-lactic conversion represent a common thread among these relatively understated wines, and although my friend and Champagne expert Peter Liem writes that “dosage is carefully thought out here,” and Chiquet’s importer Terry Theise that “Nicolas really does care about dosage schedules,” with one minor deviation, the eight wines I tasted on this occasion – presumably by mere coincidence – also had eight grams per liter of sugar in common.(David Schildknecht)

– The Wine Advocate#1113, November 2013

Well-balanced overall, this is lightly creamy in texture, with hints of poached apple, pastry, currant and candied orange peel. Disgorged September 2012. Drink now through 2018.

– Wine Spectator, November 2013

Chiquet's 2005 Brut Spécial Club is soft, creamy and ideally suited to drinking over the next few years. The open, resonant fruit is already quite expressive. I don't see the 2005 improving much over time, but it is quite beautiful right now. I very much like the sense of immediacy and generosity here, but the limits of the 2005 vintage are impossible to escape. Still, this is a solid effort for the year. The 2005 is 70% Chardonnay and 30% Pinot Noir from vineyards in Mareuil, Aÿ and Hautvillers, all done in steel. This bottle was disgorged in September 2013. Dosage is 8 grams per liter.

– vinous.com, November 2014