The Copenhagen Tasting’22 – Charles Heidsieck @ Sölleröd Kro*

For for the 17th year in a row Richard Juhlin went to Copenhagen to enjoy ‘The Copenhagen Tasting’ by Björn Leisner @ Sölleröd Kro*.

Without luggage and this year, fortunately enough, without a vaccination pass, it was the easiest thing in the world to get from Stockholm to Copenhagen because I avoided the constant troublesome SAS. I took the opportunity to have a beer in Nyhavn and watch the fatter and increasingly heavily tattooed and tastelessly dressed tourists strolling by in the summer’s first downpour before resting up at the simple but strategically placed Strand Hotel with some water and Indian jaw at the nearest brawn. I wanted to be in top shape for the incomparable Charles Heidsieck clash that awaited this year at the magical Sölleröd Kro.

The 17th edition – The Copenhagen Tasting

For the 17th consecutive year, the amazing Champagne lover Björn Leissner arranged his annual gigantic champagne tasting at the increasingly perfect Sölleröd Kro just north of Copenhagen. 17 years ago, he gathered a bunch of local champagne lovers and let me join in on a corner and I can now proudly state that it’s only me and the organizing couple who haven’t missed a single time since we started. That’s how sacred this event has become. A kind of wonderfully recurring time marker. An August dream that makes autumn’s inevitable arrival more bearable. A last breath of a warmed Scandinavia with flamboyant roses, Admiral butterflies and protein-sucking lethargic wasps around the last portions of food that are enjoyed outdoors before we close ourselves in for six months.

Sölleröd Kro*

Sölleröd is also an absolutely fantastic place in itself. A place that is one of the few where I myself feel I could live. In quiet Sölleröd, beautiful classic HC Andersen-style villas surround a small picturesque lake surrounded by an ancient stately beech forest where I always take a walk in the last hour before the tasting, and with the old church, cemetery and inn in the center. A cozy retreat with a wonderful courtyard for aperitifs and a thatched manor house and a fashionable interior with white, green and gold accents. Low ceiling but high in mood and level.