Champagne Day!
October 25th
Champagne! Those most famous of bubbles!
Things to know:
Champagne is from Champagne
To be called Champagne, it must come from Champagne. This is a designated region in France.
It is located about 200 km east of Paris.
You’ll find the cities of Reims and Epernay. Reims has been dubbed the unofficial Capital of Champagne. This was once the Capital of France, where Kings were crowned, and it is the Cathedral of Notre Dame here, that is famous for the bellringer in “The Hunchback of Notre Dame.”
Epernay lies a bit further south and, while less populated, is thought of as the Heart of Champagne.
The Grapes of Champagne
You will find Champagne primarily made from Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, and Pinot Meunier, but Arbane, Petit Meslier, Pinot Blanc, and Pinot Gris are also allowed.
Sub Regions in Champagne
There are 5 sub-regions:
- Montagne de Reims,
- Vallée la Marne,
- Cote des Blancs,
- Côte de Sézanne
- Côte des Bar
These can be listed on the label but are not separate AOCs.
On the Label
There are some important things in small print to note on the label that tell you details about who made the wine:
Vintage or Non Vintage?
Non Vintage or NV: is a champagne that blends in reserve wine. The idea is to blend away any vintage variation to create a “house style” that consumers can count on to taste the same year after year.
Vintage: This means that the wine comes from a single vintage.
Who made this wine?
Négociant Manipulant (often seen as NM on the label) means this came from a large Champagne house that purchases all or at least most of their grapes, or sometimes even base wines, from other smaller growers or producers.
Récoltant manipulant (seen as RM on the label) means that the company that made the wine also grew the grapes. We call this a Grower Champagne. They can be small and hard to find, but they are typically well worth it!
Champagne Styles:
You might see names on the bottle that indicate the style of wine. Blanc de Blancs are only made from white grapes, and Blanc de Noirs are only from black grapes. Both look the same, the are “Blanc” or white in color.
If the wine is pink or rosé, it has a bit of tint from red grapes. This might be because they blended a bit of red wine with the white, or they might have allowed the black grapes to rest on their skins for a while to give some of that color.
Sweetness levels:
Dosage indicates the amount of sweetness added to balance the acidity of the wine (remember, sparkling wines are picked early to get that bright acid).
The sweetness level is determined by how much sugar is in the wine by grams per liter.
Check out the chart to find the perfect sweetness level for you! Remember, spicier foods are great with sweeter wines!
I suggest finding a bottle of Grower Champagne, vintage if you can, maybe made from Pinot Meunier (my favorite of the Champagne grapes). You will be paying a little more (who am I kidding, a lot more) than for other sparking wines, so splurge on the really good stuff and soak in the wonder of those bubbles!
For more in-depth information on Champagne, visit Comité Champagne
More on Champagne from
Crushed Grape Chronicles
Robin Renken is a wine writer and Certified Specialist of Wine and WSET 3 Certified. She and her husband Michael travel to wine regions interviewing vineyard owners and winemakers and learning the stories behind the glass.
When not traveling they indulge in cooking and pairing wines with food at home in Las Vegas.
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