Behind the bubbles

Christine da Mota owns The Wine Specialist of the Outer Banks with her husband, Fernando. Visit their website: www.thewinespecialistobx.com

Champagne. The word evokes New Year’s eve, romance, weddings, celebrations, Paris. It is the perfect beverage to toast with: elegant, refined, expensive.

But what is in a bottle of champagne, and what makes it so costly yet worthwhile? Are there alternatives? And should sparkling wine be reserved for special occasions?

Champagne is expensive, but rightfully so. A lot of work and craftsmanship goes into a bottle of Champagne and its production is limited, geographically and quantitatively. Champagne comes exclusively from the Champagne region in Northern France. Other sparkling wines use the methode traditionelle in production, but the result is still not equal to the real deal.

The French are very strict with their wine appellations. They are strict about their geographical limitations, allowed varietals, methods used to produce them,and also the quantities produced. With all these restrictions in mind, there is also the craftsmanship, the savoir faire both in the vineyard and in the winery. Hundreds of years of tradition have made Champagnes what they are today.

There are three grape varietals used in Champagne: Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier and Chardonnay. Most champagnes on the market are a blend of all three. But a Blanc de Noirs is made of Pinot Noir and/or Pinot Meunier. A Blanc de Blancs is 100 percent Chardonnay.

Champagnes can be vintage ( a specific year of wine used only) and will have the year on the label, or non-vintage, thus a blend of different vintages. They can be Grand Cru or Premier Cru, meaning they come from a vineyard with that distinction. They can be special cuvees such as the infamous Roederer Cristal or Perrier Jouet Cuvee Belle Epoque (the Flower Label) or Moet et Chandon’s Dom Perignon.

Without delving into the details about how a bottle of Champagne is produced, it is noteworthy that once the grapes are harvested, they undergo a strict process of vinification and aging before they are shipped to us for enjoyment.

The Methode Traditionelle entails artfully blending the wines, then having the blend undergo a second fermentation in the same bottle in which it will eventually be sold. After the second fermentation, the wine is aged for a minimum of 15 months for non-vintage Champagnes, and three years for vintage Champagnes.

At the end of the aging process, the wine bottles are disgorged, meaning the neck of the bottle is frozen, the frozen deposits removed and a special liqueur ( a wine/sugar blend) added and the bottle re-corked. How much sweetness is added at this final stage determines the level of sweetness of the wine. They range from the sweetest to the driest in this order : doux, demi sec, sec, extra sec, brut and brut nature. Brut nature has absolutely no sweetness. We most commonly find demi sec and brut in the American market.

When you buy a California Sparkling, made by the French Champagne houses, i.e. Carneros (made by Taittinger), Chandon (made by Moet et Chandon) or Roederer Estate, you are getting wine made using the same techniques, but not from the same terroir. Terroir is the French term that en-globes the geology, geography and climate of a certain place. These matter when it comes to grapes.

The expression of the terroir is very important in Champagne, and that is why, no matter how hard they try, the California sparkling wines will never be exactly the same; the grapes will never produce the same flavors or density. Yet they are similar enough to produce quality wines definitely worth purchasing, and would be the closest you could come to Champagne-like wine in the New World.

Other regions and countries that make sparkling wines using the same method include, but are not limited to: Burgundy in France (Cremant de Bourgogne), the Loire Valley (Cremant de Loire), the Alsace region (Cremant d’Alsace), the Penedes region in Spain (Cava), California, and even New Mexico (Domaine Gruet).

Champagne and sparkling wines are not just for special occasions. They pair well with a variety of foods and can be served through the entire meal.

Cheese: mild ripe or semi-soft cheese cheese (Brie, Camembert, Port Salut, and my favorite but hard to get, Chaource from the Champagne region, and French goat cheese).

Appetizers: foie gras and other pates, seafood (avoid vinegar or lemon sauces with this), sushi, raw oysters, fried calamari, escargot, and stuffed mushrooms.

Main course: A Brut Champagne, California Brut Sparkling or even a Spanish Cava will go well with fried foods (cordon bleu, fried seafood, fried chicken, you name it!), as well as creamy dishes like Italian pasta dishes and risottos, or creamy French dishes, which go perfectly with a blanc de blancs.

Dessert: One should probably stick to demi-sec Champagnes when it comes to dessert, but when I lived in France, the French did not hesitate to open any kind of Champagne with dessert. In fact, I believe it was a crime to NOT open Champagne with dessert!

My recommendations for the Holiday Season?

For something really special, go for a grower Champagne. A grower Champagne means in lieu of the wine being produced by the big Champagne houses, it is produced by a family-run domain that makes wine from it own vineyards, in limited production. My favorite is the Pascal Doquet Blanc de Blancs, made with 100 percent Chardonnay grapes. The Doquets take their Champagnes very seriously, and surpass what is required by them by law. This Champagne is aged from two to three years, well above the 15 months required by law, giving it depth and roundness not found in other Champagnes. It retails for around $50 a bottle.

From one of the big houses, the Bollinger Special Cuvee Brut is an excellent purchase. Made mostly with Pinot Noir, it also has 25 percent Chardonnay and 15 perent Pinot Meunier. Bollinger adds some reserve wine to this Champagne giving it complexity not found in other non vintage wines. It retails for around $ 80.

For a delicious California Sparkler, go for the Mumm Napa Brut Napa Valley Prestige, aged for 18 months on the lees and one of the Wine Spectator’s top 100 wines this year, retailing for under $20.

Lastly, if you want something really affordable, and made in the Methode Traditionnelle, try a Cava from Spain. Cristallino is a definite favorite and retails for under $8.

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