Champagne
by Brenda Francis
There once was a growing area in France that envied Burgundy. Its growers planted chardonnay and pinot noir, just like Burgundy. Because they were to the north, they struggled even more than Burgundy to get their grapes ripened. For centuries they sat quietly in Burgundy's shadow.
     Sometime in the sixteenth century the necks on some bottles of wine froze in an abbey wine cellar and pushed out their corks. One of the resourceful monks removed the frozen wine refilled the bottles and re-corked them. When they opened the bottles sometime later they discovered the wine was carbonated.
     Over the next century they would go from hating the bubbles to embracing them. Although one particular monk, Dom Perignon, would develop and advance winemaking techniques for his new styled wine that would become widely accepted throughout Champagne and France, he is not its inventor. Napoleon and his armies are responsible for introducing Champagne to Eurasia. Traveling with his own celebratory cache, it soon became as recognized as Bordeaux and Burgundy.
     Champagne can be made with chardonnay, pinot noir, and pinot meunier in any combination. It goes through a set of meticulous processes called Methode Champenoise. Producers all over the world have adopted these processes in order to replicate the quality of Champagne for their sparkling wines.
     There are over 15,000 growers selling their grapes to big negociants in Champagne. Rarely does a grower make sparkling wine from their own grapes as they do in other regions. Negociants are names like Moët & Chandon, Veuve Clicquot, Pommery, Piper Heidsieck, Charles Heidsieck, Mumm, and Laurent-Perrier. These Champagne Houses create a consistent style of wine, called a house cuvée, and count on its devoted followers to buy their brand year after year. Because they are so large, it is easy for them to produce a wine with a consistent flavor. Cuvées are a blend of many years. A vintage Champagne is made from the grapes of only one, exceptional year and will state the year on the label. A cuvée will contain vintage years in its blend as well as non-vintage and will often be denoted NV on the label.
     A version called blanc de blancs, meaning white of whites, is 100% chardonnay. Blanc de noir, meaning white of blacks, is a blend heavy on the black skinned grapes, pinot noir and pinot meunier. It can be darker in color than blanc de blancs, sometimes offering a rosy hue. Brisk and zesty brut and extra dry have less residual sugar than demi-sec, which can be round and luscious.
     Finding your favorite cuvée can be an enjoyable adventure. Vintage bottles are extraordinary, pricey, and fleeting, but can take your journey to a new level. Don't dismiss Champagne producers' rosé offerings, vintage versions are often deemed the finest a producer can offer.