Nine vintages of one walled Pinot Noir parcel, followed by ratafia from the same Mareuil-sur-Aÿ clos, is not how most Champagne dinners in New York begin. On Friday, October 16, 2026, La Fête du Champagne will place Billecart-Salmon’s Clos Saint-Hilaire at the center of a $2,250 plus tax dinner at Sixty Three Clinton, with Mathieu Roland-Billecart guiding the room through three decades of the house’s single-parcel Blanc de Noirs.

Exclusive Members Discount

• 18% discount on the New York Magnum Package, Grand Tasting + Gala Dinner
• Members price: $1,350 + tax (regular package price: $1,650 + tax). Save $300 per package.
• What you get: One ticket to the New York Grand Tasting and one ticket to the Gala Dinner.
• Discount code: PEARL. The booking link includes the code.
• How to book:Book the New York Magnum Package.

This offer applies only to the Grand Tasting + Gala Dinner package. Other dinners and masterclasses are ticketed separately. Taxes and any applicable fees are shown at checkout.

The Billecart-Salmon Clos Saint-Hilaire Dinner is part of La Fête du Champagne’s 2026 New York program. It begins at 7:00pm ET at Sixty Three Clinton, 63 Clinton St, New York, NY 10002. Chef Sam Clonts will prepare a modern, seasonal tasting menu. The evening includes Le Sous Bois from magnum, nine vintages of Clos Saint-Hilaire and ratafia made from the same vineyard. Exact wines and vintages are subject to change.

A single-parcel Champagne vertical, not a prestige-cuvée sampler

Collectors often use verticals to calibrate a producer. Here, the frame is tighter. Clos Saint-Hilaire comes from a single parcel in Mareuil-sur-Aÿ, is made exclusively from Pinot Noir, and is vinified in oak casks. That makes the October dinner less a tour of the Billecart-Salmon range than a study of site, vintage and cellar choice through one narrowly drawn lens.

Mathieu Roland-Billecart will lead his first Clos Saint-Hilaire vertical, with nine vintages spanning nearly three decades. It is a rare opportunity to taste this small-production cuvée across so many years with the head of the house.

The value here is not breadth. It is concentration. Many Champagne events move from Chardonnay to Pinot Noir, grand cru to premier cru, non-vintage to prestige cuvée. This dinner does the opposite. It holds the variables steady enough that you can listen for the differences between 1996, 2002, 2008 and the warmer-year trio of 2003, 2005 and 2009. That is a collector’s kind of pleasure.

The announced wines and the shape of the evening

The reception begins with Billecart-Salmon Le Sous Bois from magnum. Its oak vinification introduces a feature shared with Clos Saint-Hilaire, which is also vinified in oak casks.

The Clos Saint-Hilaire vertical then proceeds through three flights, each organized by the event around a vintage archetype. The first flight highlights tension with 2008, 1996 and 2007. The second turns to warmth with 2009, 2003 and 2005. The third considers generosity with 2006, 1998 and 2002. This is more interesting than a simple old-to-young sequence. Champagne rarely ages in a straight line, and a structured flight can reveal whether acidity, fruit weight, oak integration and lees-derived texture have moved together or pulled apart.

The wine list:

• Champagne Billecart-Salmon, Le Sous Bois en magnum
• Champagne Billecart-Salmon, Le Clos Saint-Hilaire 2009
• Champagne Billecart-Salmon, Le Clos Saint-Hilaire 2008
• Champagne Billecart-Salmon, Le Clos Saint-Hilaire 2007
• Champagne Billecart-Salmon, Le Clos Saint-Hilaire 2006
• Champagne Billecart-Salmon, Le Clos Saint-Hilaire 2005
• Champagne Billecart-Salmon, Le Clos Saint-Hilaire 2003
• Champagne Billecart-Salmon, Le Clos Saint-Hilaire 2002
• Champagne Billecart-Salmon, Le Clos Saint-Hilaire 1998
• Champagne Billecart-Salmon, Le Clos Saint-Hilaire 1996
• Ratafia from Clos Saint-Hilaire

Exact wines and vintages are subject to change.

What Clos Saint-Hilaire brings from Mareuil-sur-Aÿ

Billecart-Salmon uses draft horses for plowing and sheep to maintain the cover crop in Clos Saint-Hilaire. Plants along the vineyard walls, bird houses, beehives and two small ponds support biodiversity.

You do not need to romanticize that picture for it to matter. A walled parcel worked with horses and sheep is not a branding abstraction when the entire dinner is devoted to the wines it produces. The appeal lies in the way the evening reduces noise: one village, one parcel, one variety, one oak-cask vinification approach, nine vintages. For Champagne lovers who plan travel around vineyards rather than cellars alone, that is the closest a New York dinner can come to putting Mareuil-sur-Aÿ on the table.

Clos Saint-Hilaire is released in just 3,500 to 5,500 individually numbered bottles per vintage. Tasting nine vintages together offers a comparison that is difficult to assemble from individual purchases.

Mathieu Roland-Billecart and Sixty Three Clinton

The event lists Mathieu Roland-Billecart as host, identifying him as CEO of Billecart-Salmon and a seventh-generation member of one of Champagne’s few remaining family-owned houses. That presence matters. Clos Saint-Hilaire is not a cuvée that needs a quick introduction and then recedes into dinner chatter. Nine vintages of the same Pinot Noir parcel ask for context: why these years, why these groupings, and how the house understands oak in relation to the site.

Chef Sam Clonts will pair the wines with a modern, seasonal tasting menu at Sixty Three Clinton. The evening moves from the Le Sous Bois reception through three Clos Saint-Hilaire flights and finishes with ratafia. Individual dishes have not yet been announced.

The pairing challenge is a serious one. These are not merely aperitif Champagnes. Pinot Noir, oak cask vinification, mature vintages and varying vintage characters ask for a kitchen that can make space for acidity, texture and bottle development. The successful menu for such a dinner will likely be one that knows when to step back. That is not a prediction about the dishes, just the practical truth of pairing rare Champagne.

Practical booking verdict for October 16

Here are the essential details for planning:

La Fête du Champagne’s 2026 New York program runs October 14 to 17, with Chicago following October 22 to 24. This dinner falls on the Friday night of the New York dates, which makes it a logical anchor if you are flying in for a Champagne-focused long weekend.