Champagne

This series of articles is intended as a beginner's guide to various world wine regions. The information is basic in nature and provided as an introduction. Suggested further reading: Sotheby's Wine Encyclopedia, Oxford Companion to Wine and World Atlas of Wine.

Michael Schumacher and his racing cohorts spray it with gay abandon. The crowning of kings and victors, the birth of a baby, engagements, marriages and special anniversaries - all are accompanied by the pop of a bubbly cork.

Champagne is synonymous with celebration but only one in every 12 bottles of sparkling wine produced worldwide is the real thing. This wine is from a specific region - Champagne, the area centred around the town of Reims, 145km north of Paris.

It's a region of gentle rolling hills and chalky limestone soils with the river Marne running through it. The climate is moderated by maritime influence - hence the ability to ripen the grapes in this most northerly of French wine-producing regions. Essentially Champagne is a blended wine made of three grape varieties - Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier and Chardonnay - and even various vintages. Pinot Meunier used to be the most common grape but has been superseded by Pinot Noir with 40% of plantings, while Chardonnay accounts for 25%.

What makes Champagne unique is its sparkle - the constant stream of fine bubbles rising through the golden liquid. This is a result of the secondary fermentation the wine undergoes in bottle.

Simply put, the grapes are harvested and a still wine made. This wine is then bottled and a mixture of wine, sugar and yeast - liqueur de tirage - added before the bottle is sealed with a crown cap.

The addition of sugar and yeast causes a secondary fermentation within the bottle. The resulting carbon dioxide gas is absorbed into the wine while the dead yeast cells - the lees - is gently and methodically shaken into the neck of the bottle by a process known as remuage.

The next step, dégorgement, is to get rid of the dead yeast cells. Each bottle is plunged into a freezing solution and the yeast cells form a frozen plug which is expelled when the cap is taken off.

The final process is the addition of the dosage - a small amount of liqueur wine added to top up the bottle before it is finally corked, wired closed and labelled. That's a very simplified form of how Champagne is made. The truth of the matter is that various Champagne houses have distinctive styles and the assemblage of base wines from numerous villages within the region requires great skill and finesse in order to duplicate their house style year after year.

Chef de Cave at Veuve Clicquot Jacques Péters says tasting the hundreds of base wines from the different villages and vineyards takes his team of 10 two months! By the year 2004 it is estimated that around 32 500 hectares of vineyards will have been planted in Champagne. While consumers automatically think of the big houses - Laurent Perrier, Veuve Cliquot, Bollinger, Moët & Chandon - they only lay claim to 10% of the vineyards. The rest belong to 19 000 small growers - who either make their own bubbly or sell to the larger houses; 17 villages have Grand

Cru status while a further 40 can claim Premier Cru status.

Visiting a Champagne house is a unique experience. Over the years long tunnels have been excavated in the chalky soils. Underneath Epernay is a rabbit warren of tunnels which house millions of bottles of Champagne, either undergoing secondary fermentation or ageing.

There are many theories about how Champagne was first made but the most popular one is that Dom Perignon, a monk at a Benedictine monastery in Hautvillers, just north of Epernay, unwittingly created the fabled drink and is believed to have said that he was "drinking the stars".

STYLES OF CHAMPAGNE

NON-VINTAGE
The bulk of all Champagne produced is non-vintage.
The law requires that it have a minimum of 15 months ageing - or one year from 1 January after the harvest. This is usually the most consistent style of Champagne, as the various houses strive to replicate the same flavour spectrum year after year.

VINTAGE
Vintage Champagne is produced in much smaller volumes and 80% of it has to be from a specific year's harvest which is indicated on the label. Up to 20% of the wine is kept back for future blending. These wines - because they're made in smaller quantities and reflect the vagaries of a specific vintage - are more expressive, more complex and elegant, and typically at their best around a decade after the vintage. Must be aged for a minimum of three years before release.

BLANC DE BLANCS
Translated literally this means 'white of whites' - or a Champagne made entirely from Chardonnay grapes. No black grapes - Pinot Meunier or Pinot Noir - are used.

BLANC DE NOIR
This translates to 'white of black' and indicates that the Champagne has been made from Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier grapes only. Highly unusual to find this type.

ROSÉ
A delicately pink bubbly made either by allowing some skin contact with the black grapes or by blending a bit of red base wine.

PRESTIGE CUVÉE
Many houses have their best wine identified separately. These are the flagships. The most famous examples include Moët & Chandon's Dom Perignon, Veuve Clicquot's La Grande Dame and Louis Roederer's Kristal.

VINTAGES

1996 - a classic.

1990 - a glorious year, the best all round since 1982. Wines showed richness and succulence, and fine balance and persistence.

1982 - described as a year which produced voluptuously rich Champagnes of extraordinary consistency.

WEBSITES
www.champagne.fr
www.champagne-online.com
www.tourisme-champagne-ardennes.com
www.champagne-ardennes.com

FACT FILE:

Grapes: Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Pinot Meunier.

Soils: Limestone and chalk dominate. Chalk in particular is very porous and imparts a unique character to the grapes - high acidity. The soils retain heat and reflect it onto the vines during the nights.

Rainfall: 630mm annually

Climate: Continental with warm
summers and cool winters. The average annual temperature is around 10°C. It can be wet - especially before harvest. Frost can be a problem in spring and autumn.

Style
a) Brut
b) Extra-Sec
c) Sec
d) Demi-Sec
e) Doux

Amount of sugar added
a) 0-2%
b) 2 -3%
c) 3-6%
d) 6-8%
e) 8-10%

Sugar content
a) less than 15g/l
b) 12-20g/l
c) 17- 35g/l
d) 35-50g/l
e) more than 50g/l