Warm and rich, offering spice, leather and gently oxidative notes, with toast, citrus and ginger. It's all married to a refined texture and vibrant structure, keeping this focused and persistent, with a wonderful kaleidoscopic finish. Drink now through 2012.

– Wine Spectator, November 2008

Nostril-clearing aromas of lime, lemon, grapefruit, mint, flint and baking spices; Puligny-like in its complexity, precision and subtle minerality. Concentrated, focused and penetrating, with great class and subtlety of red berry and grapefruit flavor. Really builds on the back half. A nervy, taut wine that finishes with bracing lemony acidity. Still an infant but a great bottle in the making; I'd lay it down for at least five more years.

– vinous.com, November 2001

(L130U372903): Light, bright gold. Mineral-accented scents of pear skin, orange pith and white flowers are lifted by a gingery nuance. Pliant, dense and rich, with palate-coating orchard fruit and spicecake flavors and a smoky mineral quality building with air. Weighty and broad but energetic, with bright minerality adding lift and cut to a strikingly persistent finish. (Josh Raynolds)

– vinous.com, December 2012

Les Réserves was born when Bernard de Nonancourt's daughter, Lucie Pereyre's mother, found some magnums and jeroboams of Grand Siècle No 17 in the Laurent-Perrier cellar after her father died in 2010 and they wanted to celebrate the house's bicentenary in 2012. This release, to be offered in October 2022, available in magnums only, is essentially long-aged Grand Siècle No 20, which was 60% 1999 and roughly 20% apiece of 1997 and 1996. The final blend was 54% Chardonnay, 46% Pinot Noir, made up of eight grands crus. I was lucky enough to taste Laurent-Perrier's vintage champagnes 1999 and 1997 not that long before tasting this blend which is so much more complex and intense – as well as much fresher. Quite a feat! The wine is just this side of toasty but has massive impact and almost suggests some torrefaction. This is extremely vivacious while still being bone dry. Pungent with a hint of caramel but also lime – that's how broad the spectrum of flavours is. Very, very complete. Satisfying, revitalising – what I'd call a sore-throat wine, so intense is its finish. Difficult to see how anyone would be disappointed by this, the essence of Grand Siècle. (JR)

Creamy, yoghurt, peach, dried herbs and baked apple – lots going on here. Substantial and fragrant. (RH)