Quick Take
In Part 2 of her biweekly column, Lookout wine expert Laurie Love recommends a very special of bubbly for holiday celebrations as her Wine of the Week, and covers the basics of Champagne in her Wine 101 lesson.
Editor’s note: This is Part 2 of this week’s Laurie Love on Wine column, with Laurie’s Wine of the Week pick and her Wine 101 lesson. Click here for Part 1, covering wine news and events.
Welcome to Laurie Love on Wine! I am Laurie Love, a professional wine writer and educator based in Santa Cruz. In this column, I share my wine passion, knowledge, and experience with Lookout readers. Follow me on my wine blog, Laurie Loves Wine, and on Instagram at LaurieLoveOnWine. I love email from readers! Stay in touch: Email me at laurie@lookoutlocal.com. Join me as we journey together through the wonderful world of wine.
WINE OF THE WEEK
Each column, I share a particular wine that I’m enjoying now. The Wine of the Week this week is …
Looking for something very special to toast on New Year’s Eve? This is it. Laurent-Perrier is a grand marque house in Champagne, France, established in 1812, and “Grand Siècle” is its prestige cuvée — meaning its top of the line. I was fortunate to be able to taste this Champagne (along with many others) at a recent tasting. This is a luxury Champagne redolent with elegance and finesse that is probably one of the best wines I’ve ever tasted.
Grand Siècle is always a blend of three different vintages and is not made every year. Iteration #26 blends base wines from 2006 (10%), 2007 (25%) and 2012 (65%). It is also a blend of grapes with 58% chardonnay and 42% pinot noir, all from eight Grand Cru vineyard sites across Champagne. The wine rests “sur lie” (on the lees, or spent yeast cells) in bottle down in the deep chalk caves of Laurent-Perrier for 10 years. Dosage was 7 grams per liter, barely pushing it to the brut level of sweetness. (See Wine 101 below for an explanation of dosage.)
The pale gold wine starts with delicate and persistent fine-bead bubbles in the glass, a result of the longer lees aging time. The aromas are incredibly complex yet delicate and elegant at the same time: white floral notes like honeysuckle, citrus notes (lemon, tangerine), cream, brioche, hazelnut and touch of ginger. The wine dances delicately across the palate with lovely chalky, chardonnay notes, lemon, crème fraiche, honey, toast and almond paste delivered effortlessly by the foamy, creamy bubbles. The acidity is high but in balance by the weight of its medium body. The finish is long and satisfying, with all those lovely flavors mingling with minerality and those bubbles that go on for days. You just don’t want the experience to ever end.
This Champagne won many awards and accolades already this year, including top honors from noted wine critic James Suckling, who awarded it 100 points and “Wine of the Year” on jamessuckling.com. It was also ranked the highest champagne (luxury or otherwise) in Wine Enthusiast’s list of Top 100 Cellar Selections of 2023. And Decanter.com and Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate each gave it 96 points.
You can find this champagne at local retailers and grocery stores with higher-end wine sections. It is available at K&L Wine Merchants (Redwood City). Enjoy!
Wine Q&A
Got wine questions? I’ve got answers. Email me at laurie@lookoutlocal.com.
Question: Can you recommend a very dry, not sweet, good sparkling wine under $40? I prefer Champagne or cava. Thank you!
Julie T.
Laurie’s reply: Thank you for your question. This is the time of year when many people like yourself are searching for the perfect bottle of bubbly to ring in the new year. Most true Champagnes (made in the French region of Champagne) are well over $40 a bottle. That is because of the labor- and time-intensive process of making Champagne in the traditional method, where the wine undergoes two distinct fermentations and ages for years in bottle before being released. (See my Wine 101 below for more info.)
However, one favorite Champagne in this price range comes to mind that I can highly recommend. Launois “Cuvée Résérvée” Grand Cru Brut Blanc de Blancs is $35 a bottle and is a direct import from K&L Wine Merchants (Redwood City). The wine comes from the Grand Cru village of Mesnil-sur-Oger in the Côte des Blancs region of Champagne, which is known for chardonnay-based Champagne. This wine is 100% chardonnay (thus the “blanc des blancs” designation), is quite dry and offers amazing quality for value. Find more info on Launois here.
Cava, which is also made in the traditional method, is typically quite a bit less expensive. I recommend Julie Bernet Corpinnat “Cuvée U” Brut Nature. This is a fantastic and affordable dry sparkling wine based on xarel-lo, one of the traditional grapes of cava, and ages on the lees for two years prior to release. Corpinnat is a separate, higher quality-level designation than cava, and has more stringent rules of production. For example, Corpinnat requires grapes to be sourced from certified organic vineyards and harvested by hand. I have seen it at Staff of Life Market for around $25.
One of my very favorite Champagnes is the Veuve Fourny et Fils Blanc de Blancs Premier Cru Brut Nature, but it is closer to $65 a bottle. This Fourny (purple label) is super dry, fresh and crisp with extra long-lasting bubbles, 100% chardonnay from the Premier Cru village of Vertus in the Côte des Blancs region of Champagne. I visited the Fourny Champagne house this summer and was blown away by the excellent quality of their wines and the family’s warm and generous hospitality. Look for more information on this wine here.
WINE 101
Whether you’re a wine novice or seasoned expert, there’s always something new to learn in the wide and wild world of wine.
Tis the season for champagne and sparkling wine, so it’s a good time to talk about what is champagne, how is it different from sparkling wine, and how is it made. Besides, champagne is one of my favorite topics and favorite beverages, and I’m happy to talk about it (and drink it) anytime.
Champagne is sparkling wine made in the traditional champagne method in the French appellation of Champagne, located a lovely one-hour drive northeast of Paris, France. Any sparkling wine made outside of Champagne cannot legally be called champagne. In fact, other traditional method sparklers made elsewhere in France are called crémant, as in Crémant de Bourgogne, Crémant de Limoux and so on. (Note for clarity that in this section I use lowercase champagne for the beverage and uppercase Champagne for the region.)
The traditional method of champagne production involves a long, labor- and time-intensive process that is dictated by very strict appellation rules. To start, the winemaker creates base wine, which is a regular still wine made in the typical way (crush, fermentation and aging) but at higher acidity and lower alcohol than a regular wine. A champagne house will usually make several base wines each year depending on its house style, possibly one from each grape variety, one from each sourced vineyard and so on.
After the base wine is made, the next step is to create the blend. Most champagnes are a blend of base wines from multiple vintages (known as non-vintage, or NV on the label), a blend of the three traditional champagne wine grapes (chardonnay, pinot noir and meunier), a blend of vineyards and villages and so on. The blending step is very important because it ensures that a champagne house’s style is consistent from one year to the next.
Once the base wines are blended to the house’s specifications, the wine is bottled and receives the first of two additions. The first addition is the liqueur de tirage, a mix of sugar, yeast and wine that is added to the bottle before the wine is capped and laid on its side to age. After the tirage addition, the yeast consumes the sugar, which creates the bubbles and increases the alcohol level. At the same time, the yeast cells die out and become lees. The wine then rests on the lees (“sur lie”) in champagne caves. For non-vintage champagne, the sur lie aging time is a minimum of 12 months; for vintage champagne (when all the base wine comes from one year’s harvest), the minimum aging time is three years. This is an important step, not only because it creates the bubbles, but it also gives the wine complexity, toast and brioche notes, creamy texture and fine-bead bubbles.
After the wine completes sur lie aging, the wine is clarified of the lees debris through riddling and disgorgement. Riddling is a slow process of carefully moving the bottle over the period of weeks into an upside-down position so the lees collect in the neck of the bottle. After lees aging, champagne bottles have built up a great deal of interior pressure. So careful and slow movements are necessary to reduce the possibility of exploding bottles. Then the lees sediment forms a plug in the neck and is disgorged by quickly snapping off the bottle cap. The lees plug comes out along with a little bit of wine, so the wine goes through a second addition: dosage.
Dosage is the addition of wine and sugar: wine to replace what was lost during disgorging and sugar to set the sweetness level. Sweetness levels range from very dry (brut nature at zero dosage) to very sweet (doux at 50-plus grams per liter of sugar). Brut is the most common sweetness level, with up to 12 grams per liter of sugar added. However, with climate change, grapes in the northern climes of Champagne are ripening more fully with more available sugar at harvest, so we are seeing more brut nature and extra brut categories (both drier styles) on the market. At the same time, global tastes have shifted to drier styles of champagne. After dosage, the bottles are corked, capped and labeled, and rest for a few months before shipping out to market.
This same process is used to make other traditional method sparkling wines around the world, including Franciacorta in northern Italy, cava in Spain and many others. Prosecco, “pét nat,” Asti and other styles of sparkling wine are made using production methods other than the traditional method, a topic I will cover another time.
Some of my favorite champagnes are Laurent-Perrier “Grand Siècle” Champagne, Laurent-Perrier Brut Rosé (100% pinot noir), Krug “Grand Cuvée” Champagne, Veuve Clicquot “Yellow Label” Champagne, Ruinart Blanc de Blancs Champagne, Launois Champagnes, Veuve Fourny Champagnes and many others. I also love traditional-method Crémant d’Alsace Brut Rosé from Allimant-Laugner, made from 100% pinot noir (available for about $25 at Whole Foods Market). What are some of your favorite sparklers? Hope you have a great bottle to ring in the new year. Happy New Year!
Until next time!
Cheers, Laurie
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