Champagne, Cava, Sparkling wine and the American connection
Sparkling wine, by definition, is “Wine that contains bubbles of carbon dioxide gas.”
Anyone who has tasted the stuff knows that it is so much more than a bottle of bubbly. Any winery that produces a sparkling wine knows that it’s just not that simple.
Sparkling wine has become synonymous with CELEBRATIONS, and a toast just isn’t the same with a glass of Martinelli’s (Sorry, Mom!).
Nearly every wine producing country has a rendition of sparkling wine. The Champagne region of France has dibs on Champagne, probably the most familiar of all the sparkling wines. There is the Spanish sparkler, Cava, the Italian’s have their Spumante, and if you want to get a little crazy with a red sparkling wine, try Australia’s sparkling Shiraz. That of course is just the tip of the fizzy iceberg, but I’m here to discuss American sparkling wine.
Most fine American sparkling wine is made using the methode champenoise (your grocery store brands like Andre and Cook’s utilize the charmat method to infuse the wine with carbon dioxide bubbles).
The Korbel brothers introduced sparkling wines to American production in 1892 by producing wines using Riesling, Muscatel, Traminer and Chasselas grapes. As sparkling production picked up throughout California, many noted Champagne houses came to set up wineries in the region, including Moet et Chandon (Domaine Chandon), Louis Roederer (Roederer Estate), & Taittinger (Domaine Carneros).
This foreign influence brought more traditional grapes into the production of American sparkling wine – Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier, Pinot Blanc and of course, Chardonnay. However, just because American sparkling wine is made in the methode champenoise utilizing traditional Champagne grapes doesn’t mean that American bubbly isn’t distinctly different.
First of all, the varying regions in America that produce sparkling wines have climates and soil compositions quite different from that in Champagne! This allows for an amazing array of different flavors.
You also have to look at the blends. In Champagne, a cuvée can contain upwards of 50 different wines from 4-6 different vintages. In American sparkling wine production, cut those numbers in half and you’ll be close.
And let’s face it – American sparkling wine is just not bound by the traditions of the French Champagne. You’ll discover American bubbly produced from non-traditional grapes, like Mandolina Wines’ Bianco di Bianco, a blend of 2/3rds Muscat and 1/3 Chenin Blanc. You’ll find American sparkling wine in a can, like Rosso & Bianco’s Sofia Mini Blanc de Blancs. And American wineries are producing some pretty fun stuff as well, like Su Vino’s Raspberry “Champagne”.
So whether you want to go a little more traditional (Mumm Napa, Laetitia, Domaine Chandon) or you want to have some fizzy fun (Rosso & Bianco, Su Vino, Mandolina Wines), you’ll discover that America’s sparkling wine may not be “Champagne”, but like the land of opportunity itself, America’s sparkling wine producers are making a little something for everybody.
Cheers!
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November 20th, 2008 at 3:55 am
Hi I read your post and I think you miss a big point about sparkling wine, the definition is incomplete the bubbles of carbon dioxide gas must be a result of a second fermentation, because if the dioxide gas is injected, it is no more a sparkling, that wine fall into a diferent category
November 20th, 2008 at 8:12 am
Hello, Alex! Thanks for bringing the second fermentation up, since most sparkling wines do get “bubbly” due to second fermentation. Of course with méthode champenoise – the 2nd fermentation takes place in the bottle. However, there are generally 3 other ways to infuse the wine with carbon dioxide to create sparkling wines – I didn’t even touch on the transfer method (similar to méthode champenoise except you replace the riddling and disgorgement processes and instead convey the wine through a pressurized filtration system and then rebottle it). I briefly touched on the Charmat process, commonly used by mass producers of American sparkling wine like Andre – the charmat method uses large pressurized interconnecting tanks throughout production, which retain the pressure created during a second fermentation throughout the entire process.
A fourth, less successful method called carbonation, quite simply injects carbon dioxide directly into the wine. This method is used only for very inexpensive wines, and the resulting product can struggle to retain effervescence and taste a bit “off.”
I hope that information is helpful to all the sparkling fans out there!