It may cost $10,000, but the largest bottle of bubbly in the world is sure to keep champagne flutes filled this Christmas.
Wine retailer Glengarry has the 30-litre hand-blown glass champagne bottle of Drappier Carte d'Or NV in the cellar at its Victoria Park store in Auckland.
French champagne house Drappier is the only maker of the bottles, known as Melchizedeks, The New Zealand Herald reported.
Drappier started making them after a customer, who had said he had too many friends, kept asking for a larger size for his parties because he liked them all drinking from the same bottle, Glengarry general manager Liz Wheadon says.
"He would ring and say, `I would like a large bottle for my birthday' and they would produce one... then year by year the man kept ringing and asked for a bigger one," she said.
About 20 per cent of Melchizedeks, which hold 40 standard-sized 750ml bottles, exploded during fermentation, she said.
NZN