Bubbly Beebly Doo

By Abel Busoni
Contributing Writer

With the all the to-do about the rise of American wine in a culture not known for its grapevine affinities, sparkling wine has been surprisingly left behind. Delicious in it’s varieties, which range from dry to sweet, versatile in it’s application from aperitif to dessert (and even a food accompaniment!), and fun in the bubbly sense you might have heard about, there’s no good reason why we shouldn’t entertain thoughts of a bottle of bubbly when deciding what to eat and drink.

Sparkling wine is some sort of euphemism for champagne. The reason we can’t just call all the sparkling wine champagne is because champagne refers only to the sparkling wine made in the Champagne region of France. In fact, France, Italy, Spain (and others) all have their own bubbly with old, old names derived from the region where the bubbly is produced (champagne, asti, cava, spumante etc.). As far as I know, there isn’t a proper name for sparkling wine produced in the United States, although you can find California Champagne or California Spumante in the bottle shop. That’s probably because we drink it once a year, more out of habit than any real desire to drink it, which is surprising considering the savvy we have culled out of beer, spirits, and cocktail alchemy.

What can I do with sparkling wine?
The most typical time for bubbly is before, during, or after a meal (or served with snacks at grand openings or black tie affairs).

You can drink a dry sparkling wine before a meal, or you can make a Classic Champagne Cocktail (insert QR Code). In any case, the cool thing is that the bubbles will go directly to your head, a fun fact for anyone who has drank bubbly before. The cork pops out and immediately creates a festive atmosphere.

If you keep going with the bubbly during the meal, the festive mood will continue. Quite alright with a variety of foods, if you want to try something different, during-the-meal is also a real possibility.

If you didn’t drink bubbly during the meal, you can drink it with dessert. There are a variety of sweet bubblies, but a dry bubbly can be a good counter to a really sweet dessert.

What do I need?
To drink sparkling wine, you need two things: a flute glass and a bottle of sparkling wine.
The flute glass is important because it’s part of the whole idea of sparkling wine. Bubbly is somehow luxurious (even though 7 or 8 dollars will fetch you something drinkable) because of the bubbles. Having a glass designed to highlight the bubbles will not only please you, it will also begin the lifting motion that starts in the glass and continues long after you drain the contents.

How do I choose my bubbly?
As for the sparkling wine, the following chart explains the different levels of sweetness.
One of the problems with this rating system is that not all the California bubblies use the proper terms, instead labeling the bottles with “sweet” or “dry.” Other denominations, like the Italian Asti, just assume that you already know that Asti is sweet.

If you’re getting started, I would recommend starting with a brut and going from there. The same way that we’re all feeling our way through the thousands of beers at our fingertips, we can feel our way through the small sparkling wine section at the bottle shop.

Remaining bubbly tips
•      Start with regular sparkling wine before you get into the Rose. That way, you know what it is before you venture into the outer territories.

•      Try not to remove the cork too fast, because the bottle will overflow.

•      Read the back of the labels if you get confused.

•      Get some flute glasses at the store. Like all glassware, you can spend a fortune or you can just get some glasses that will do the trick. Either way, you’ll have more fun if you have some proper flutes.

•      The open style bubbly glasses are cool too, but flutes are more fun.

•      Start with Brut, which is dry but versatile, and then start moving out into the dry or sweet bubblies.

•      Pair a dry bubbly before the meal with some snacks or fruit. Like strawberries. You can also pair it with cheese.

•      Pair a sweet bubbly with dessert. When you have a sweet bubbly, you can get away with semi-sweet desserts made with a high percentage of chocolate or just less sugar.

•      Avoid Freixenet, which is a Spanish export cava. Like a lot of the Italian imports we have, Freixenet doesn’t represent the best of Spanish cava, but rather the one that seized the export business first and that real Spanish consumers don’t usually buy.

•      If you want to have a good first experience and you can afford it, get a real bottle of French champagne. It’s simply the best.

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