“In victory, you deserve champagne, in defeat, you need it.” – Napoleon Bonaparte
Champagne became popular not only because of such great quotes, but also because of celebrity endorsements or excesses. It’s no secret that 007 agent James Bond always had a strong penchant for Bollinger champagne (and vodka). And it’s been reported that Marilyn Monroe once filled her bathtub with 350 bottles of champagne and took a long, luxurious soak in it.
Champagne, the dry sparkling wine from the region of northeastern France (east of Paris) that bears the same name, has long been considered the drink of choice for toasting or celebrating a special occasion. Its image as a celebratory drink and the high price of champagne, along with Americans’ preference for sweeter drinks, have caused image and sales to plummet over the years. Fortunately, with the proliferation of inexpensive dry and non-dry sparkling wines from nearly every wine-producing region in the world, bubbly is slowly regaining some of its lost popularity.
Gone are the days when sparkling wine was only drunk to mark a special occasion or to accompany luxurious treats like caviar. Sparkling wine makes a great aperitif on its own or with simple hors d’oeuvres, seafood entrees, or sushi, or it can be enjoyed with dessert if the wine is not dry or sweet. It doesn’t have to be a Moët & Chandon Cuvée Dom Pérignon, Bollinger Grande Année or other expensive bubbly. Some of the world’s best bubbles are now produced cheaply in New World wine regions and other Old World regions such as Italy, Spain, and Eastern European countries.
And as wineries try to demystify table wines by simplifying labels, first and foremost identifying grape varieties rather than strict provenance, sparkling wine marketers are also hard at work making sparkling wine more consumer-friendly. consumer and food, that can be enjoyed any day.
Not all bubbly is champagne
The popularity of champagne has made the name synonymous with sparkling wine, but not all sparkling wines are champagne. Only sparkling wine produced in specific regions of Champagne, eg Reims and Épernay, produced by the traditional method using only Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and/or Pinot Meunier can be labeled as Champagne. (There are other production criteria, however these are the most important.) Other sparkling wines from France, but outside of Champagne, produced with the traditional method are called Crémant, while in Spain they are known as Cava.
The traditional method, more often known as champagne method Prayed traditional methodrequires bubbles to be produced naturally within each bottle by a second fermentation, known as sparklingwhich is started by adding a draft liquor, a mixture of sugar and yeast, to a still wine. Still wine is called base wine, or ancientand consists of a blend of many different wines carefully blended by the cellar master, or cellar master. The cuvée can often be a blend of hundreds of different wines. If all the component wines are from a single vintage, the final sparkling wine has a vintage date. Wineries that choose to make a consistent style year after year will blend wines from two or more vintages to produce a non-vintage or multi-vintage sparkling wine.
During bottle fermentation, the yeast consumes sugar to convert it into alcohol and carbon dioxide, as in any alcoholic fermentation; however, the gas remains trapped inside the bottle, dissolved in the wine. The pressure inside the bottle can reach up to 6 bars, approximately 90 pounds per square inch or psi, the equivalent of three times the pressure of automobile tires.
The wine is allowed to ferment for several weeks and mature very slowly at cool temperatures, between 50° and 54° F (10° and 12° C), with the bottles horizontal, or in ribbon. This prolonged contact with spent yeast cells from fermentation, a process known as yeast autolysis, is what gives sparkling wine its yeasty, nutty aromas and complex flavors. It can last anywhere from a few weeks to several years, depending on the desired flavor profile and the patience of the cellar master. After the long stay in the bottle, the dead yeast cells are dropped and collect in a special crown-cap closure, known as the contraptionthrough a labor-intensive method known as riddling.
riddle, gold riddlesis the process of twisting, turning and tilting bottles from a horizontal to a near vertical position on a screening grid, or desk, to allow used yeast cells to accumulate in the widget, a process that takes approximately three weeks. The winemaker can choose to age the sparkling wine further by moving the bottles in their upright position, or on pointto a storage container.
When the wine has reached its optimal and desired flavor profile, the winemaker removes the used yeast deposit from each bottle through a process known as disgorging, or disgorge. The bottle is held vertically, pointing downwards, and the crown cap and bidulum are removed with a throat wrench while the bottle is brought to a horizontal position. This allows the sediment to fly out of the neck of the bottle leaving the wine crystal clear, if done correctly. Often the process is made more effective by first freezing the neck of the bottle in a brine solution to freeze the sediments.
The last critical step, the Dose, consists of adding a small volume of cuvée to which a little sugar is added to balance the acidity of the wine and achieve the desired style, from dry to sweet. The English refer to this cuvée solution as the expedition liqueurand often contains a distilled spirit such as cognac.
Champagne is a cool climate grape growing area and as such the grapes do not reach high sugar levels as in warmer climates and have higher acidity hence the need to balance the sugar. The lower sugar level produces a cuvée with typically 10.0% to 11.0% alc./vol. Bottle fermentation adds another 1.5% for a total of 11.5% to 12.5% alc./vol. for the finished wine.
The final step involves inserting a cork halfway (that’s what gives the cork its distinctive mushroom shape once it’s removed) into the bottle and securing it with a wire cage.
Most sparkling wines are ready to drink once finished and can last up to two to three years in the bottle; however, the best bubbly in the world, that is, those produced with the traditional method, can live many more years with a proper cellar.
This laborious process and the long aging process explain the high price of sparkling wines made using the traditional method.
other world bubbles
The quality of sparkling wine is judged by the complexity of aroma and flavor and the size of the bubbles; the smaller the bubbles, the higher the quality. Bottle fermentation, as in the traditional method, produces the smallest bubbles; however, such sparkling wine is labor intensive and expensive to produce.
The most common and cost-effective alternative to the traditional method is the Charmat or Cuve Close (sealed tank) method, which is used to produce many of the world’s low-cost but high-quality bubbles. The bubbles produced with patience and care using this method can rival some of the great champagnes, although the method is commonly used for the quick market of cheaper sparkling wines. The bubbles in these are noticeably larger and the aromas and flavors aren’t quite as intense, but they do provide excellent value. The intensity and complexity of the flavor, and the quality in general, can be improved by a longer aging of the wine on the lees. Asti Spumante, the famous sweet low-alcohol (approximately 8% alc./vol.) sparkling wine from Piedmont (Italy), Sekt from Germany and sparkling Icewine from Ontario are examples of sparkling wines produced using the Charmat method or a variant.
The Charmat method consists of carrying out the second bulk fermentation in sealed and pressurized stainless steel tanks, and avoids the need for bottle fermentation, stirring and disgorging. The wine is then refrigerated to stop fermentation, filtered, a dose added, and then bottled under pressure so as not to lose precious carbon dioxide gas.
A less common method of making sparkling wine has gained great popularity in Russia and the Ukraine for the mass production of good quality, inexpensive bubbly. A variant of the Charmat process, the Russian or continuous method uses a series (eg 5) of sequentially connected pressurized tanks. The first reservoir contains the cuvée and the draw (sugar and yeast solution). As fermentation begins, the wine is piped through the second and third tanks, each containing wood chips to accumulate dead yeast cells (lees) and allow autolysis to occur. The wine is then channeled through the fourth and fifth tanks where it is clarified before being bottled. Although the wine is in contact with the lees for longer than in the Charmat method, the continuous method usually takes less than a month and therefore produces lower quality wines.
Another less common method is the transfer or racking method whereby bottle-fermented wine is transferred under refrigeration to a bulk transfer tank. Dosage is added and the wine is bottled under pressure.
The advantage of all of the above methods is that they eliminate the laborious screening and disgorging steps.
bubbly styles
The most popular grape variety choices in France for sparkling wine are Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, or Pinot Meunier, or a blend of any of these. Other popular varieties include Chenin Blanc, Muscat, and Riesling for whites, and Syrah (Shiraz) for reds, but there are no hard and fast rules. Sparkling rosé wine is usually made from red grapes with a very short maceration period to extract some red color, although a small percentage of red wine can be added to a white sparkling wine to achieve the desired colour, albeit with a very different flavor profile. .
A sparkling white wine made strictly from one white grape variety, such as Chardonnay, is known as white of whites whereas a sparkling white wine made from a red grape variety, such as pinot noir, is known as in black and white.
In addition to color, sparkling wines are most often classified based on the amount of residual sugar or relative dryness. For example, a Brut sparkling wine can have up to 15 g/L of residual sugar, while an Extra Brut usually has less than 6 g/L. Countries have different designations and requirements regarding residual sugar content; and different countries use different terminology which can be quite confusing.
appreciating bubbly
The sparkling wine production methods outlined above should help you better appreciate the difference between a bubbly priced at $12 and $50 or even $200 or more.
Discover the pleasures of sparkling wine by enjoying it any day of the week, and experimenting with different pairings until you discover what pleases your palate the most. So start enjoying it now, unlike John Maynard Keynes, one of the most important figures in the entire history of economics, who once said, “My only regret in life is that I didn’t drink more champagne.”