With almost 300 Champagne houses producing Champagne in the Champagne region, there’s potential for a lot of bottles to be produced each year. Around 320 million to be precise!

With
almost 300 Champagne houses producing Champagne
in the Champagne region, there’s potential for
a lot of bottles to be produced each year. Around 320 million to be precise! With
this in mind, choosing a bottle of Champagne
may sound a daunting task. But there’s no need to fear. Once you know what to
look for, deciding what to buy is simple. In this article, we cover everything
you could need to know about Champagne,
from types and styles through to bottle sizes. So once you’ve mastered your
“Brut” from your “Balthazar”, you’ll be picking out bottles of Champagne in no time.

Grapes Types

Three
grapes are used to make Champagne
- Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier and Chardonnay. Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier are
black grapes, while Chardonnay is a white grape. The quantity that each grape
is used varies according to the Champagne.
If you come across a “Blanc de Blancs”, this is Champagne which is made exclusively from the
Chardonnay grape. “Blanc de Noirs”, on the other hand, is Champagne made from the red grapes – Pinot
Noir and/ or Pinot Meunier.

Champagne Styles

Champagne comes in a range of styles from very dry through to very sweet. The
normal dry style is known as “Brut”. If you prefer a slightly drier than normal
style, look for “Extra” or “Ultra Brut”. “Sec” is slightly sweeter than normal,
“Demi Sec” is sweeter, while “Doux” is an intensely sweet and very rare style
of Champagne.

Champagne Types

The
cheapest Champagne type that you’ll come
across is “Non Vintage”. This refers to Champagne
that is blended from wines of several years and, in doing so, this ensures that
a constant style is achieved. Non-vintage Champagne
is stored for at least a year before it is sold, and is considered the entry
level or house style Champagne.
The next level of Champagne
is known as a “Vintage”. This is made from a blend wines from a particular
year, when the quality of the wine is good enough to declare a vintage. In this
case, the Champagne
will have been stored for at least three years. A very, very special bottle
produced in a vintage year, is known as a “Prestige” or “Deluxe Cuvée”. This is
the producer’s top notch Champagne and usually
costs more than three times more than a non-vintage and possibly double the
price of a vintage Champagne.
The grapes will have been hand selected and the Champagne will have been left to mature for
five to seven years. Finally, if you like your Champagne
with a pink tinge, go for a Rosé based Champagne.

Champagne Bottle Sizes

The
most common Champagne bottles that you will
come across are 75 cl bottles and Magnums (1.5 litres). However, it is also
possible to find Quarter (18.75 cl) and Half bottles (37.5cl), along with
Jeroboam (3 litres), Rehoboam (4.5 litres), Methuselah (6 litres), Salmanazar
(9 litres), Balthazar (12 litres), and Nebuchadnezzar bottles (15 litres)!

The Champagne Region

Champagne refers to the region from where it was produced. The region of Champagne is the most northerly wine region in France and the “Champenois” (the collection of Champagne producers) are fiercely protective of its
heritage. A bottle of Champagne has to be
produced in the Champagne region for it to bear the Champagne
label. So while all Champagne is classed as
sparkling wine, you will come across sparkling wine which isn’t Champagne. Spanish Cava
and Italian Prosecco are good examples.