You might wonder if champagne is truly a wine, or whether it might be in a category all on its own. Well, the truth of the matter is that champagne is a wine, and it is made with wine grapes. Often times the most common wine grapes used will be Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, and a blend of other wine grapes. The difference that you find in champagne which sets it apart from its contemporary still wines is the second fermentation process that it undergoes to get the bubbles. However not all sparkling wines can carry the Champagne name. If it wasn’t expressly made in the Champagne region of France, then no matter how close in taste you get to a real champagne, it will still be considered a sparkling wine. That’s why even though you get many champagne-like wines like the Beringer Sparkling White Zinfandel or the Jacob’s Creek Sparkling Rosé, they will always have the words sparkling in their names, or they won’t have the word champagne anywhere near their name. In truth though if not in fact, champagnes are like any other wine, and they all taste different depending upon where they were made, and the harvest quality of the grapes for that particular year. You’ll also find that as you stroll along champagne’s life’s highway that unlike wines, there is a different categorizing convention in place. For instance, in the normal course of events you wouldn’t say that you wanted a dry champagne, you would ask for a brut. To that extent here is the naming convention present in the order of champagnes. Extra Brut, Brut, Extra dry, Sec and Demi-sec, with Extra Brut being the driest champagne, and Demi-sec being the sweetest. Now, just to top it all off, I’ll give you a very short list of some champagnes that are considered to be the very best amongst the entire lot. These, I have to say, will cost you a pretty penny, and for the most part are used traditionally for celebrations. You might even have seen a bottle of champagne being broken against a ship to christen it on its maiden voyage. • Piper Heidsieck • Moet & Chandon • Taittinger • Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin • Laurent Perrier • Bollinger • Krug • Korbel Muna wa Wanjiru is a web administrator and has been researching and reporting on internet marketing for years. For more information on Champagne, visit his site at Champagne
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