Champagne Is Lovely and Here's how to serve and savor champagne

Here are Some Facts About Champagne, and Some Tips to Serve & Savor It

there is a style of champagne to please just about every palate

When I think of New Years Eve and other special events, I immediately associate them with champagne.

Every time you pop a champagne cork, you are creating a celebration of life. You really don’t need any reason to drink champagne, but New Years Eve is really the time to break out the bubbly.

There’s something just so celebratory about bringing out elegant glasses, chilling the bottle in an icy bucket, then popping the cork (remove it slowly).

You can toast the end of the new year, or the beginning of a new one, or just celebrate nothing special at all, other than being in the moment.

Not all that sparkles…

However, did you know that not every wine that bubbles or sparkles isn’t genuine champagne?

For your wine to be genuine champagne, the grapes and the creation of the wine must come from the Champagne region of France, which is a clearly defined region located about 90 miles northeast of Paris. Everything else, despite what it might claim on the label, is just sparkling wine.

You don’t have to be a millionaire or a jet-setter to drink the real thing.

You can find genuine champagne in every taste preference, and budget, from precious bottles than run upwards of hundreds and maybe thousands of dollars for rare vintages, to delicious champagnes that are under $20.00 a bottle.

If the last time you had real champagne was years ago at your cousin’s wedding, and you didn’t really love it, you might just have tried a wine that wasn’t to your taste.

Like most wine, champagne can be crafted in a variety of styles from earthy to smooth, fruit forward, mineral, and more. It can be dry, or medium dry, or quite sweet.

The most popular dryness category is “Brut” which allow for up to 15 grams of residual sugar. This is known as “dry” and it doesn’t leave a sugary taste in your mouth. But some people like the sweeter versions especially mixed as a punch, or with fresh fruit such as peaches or strawberries floating in the glass.

How to Serve!

Here are some tips to ge the most out of every sip

1. Pick the right glass. The saucer or “coupe” glass was popular in the 1920’s, but today the flute shape is more popular. The experts’ favorite glass for champagne is more like a white wine tulip shaped glass (the most popular shape for white wine).

I’m assuming it’s because in the couple, the bubbles “mousse” dissipate too quickly in the air, and in the flute, you can’t really enjoy the fruity aroma of the wine. The tulip shape is neither too flat nor too thin.

2. Chill out. Like any great wine, if you chill it too much, you kill the aroma and with it, a lot of the pleasure and taste. Keep the bottle cold, but don’t freeze it so much you can’t taste it.

3. Look at what you’re drinking. Just because something is bubbly and cold doesn’t mean you should guzzle it like soda or beer. Hold the glass in your hand by the stem, and look at the wine. Enjoy the color. Watch the energetic bubbling.

Some champagne is very pale, others are golden, yet others, pale rose to nearly red.

4 & 5: Swirl and sniff the wine. Swirling looks like an affectation, but actually, it helps to oxygenate and therefore, release the aroma. Half of what you are tasting is smell! Then smell the wine. Try to pick out select notes or note categories, such as fruits, minerals, and toast.

6. Savor the experience. Even if you don’t know a lot about wine, take note of what you are sipping. fruit, body acidity, alcohol, the longevity of bubbles, how long the finish is, etc.

Just remember as you are sipping your champagne, that its climate, chalky soil, and lineage of winemaking combine to produce a sparkling wine that can only be made in one place: Champagne, France.

There are many sparkling wines produced around the world, but now you know about the genuine item!

In 2011, according to the Champagne Bureau USA (the official U.S. representative of the Comité Interprofessionnel du Vin de Champagne, a trade association which represents the grape growers and houses of Champagne, France), an organization that helps to protect the Champagne name, in 2011, Champagne shipped more than 19.3 million bottles to the United States, making the United States Champagne’s largest export market outside of Europe.

For more information, visit the Champagne Bureau online at http://www.champagne.us/

Follow them on Twitter at @ChampagneBureau.