{"id":1393,"date":"2019-10-31T14:15:39","date_gmt":"2019-10-31T14:15:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1393"},"modified":"2019-11-04T19:16:48","modified_gmt":"2019-11-04T19:16:48","slug":"champagne-wine-tasting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1393","title":{"rendered":"Champagne \u2013 Wine Tasting"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>With thousands of Champagnes to choose from, wine tasting in that region may feel overwhelming.\u00a0 Where do you start?\u00a0 How many can you taste?\u00a0 Should you stick with Champagnes that you know or be adventurous and try a few glasses from producers unknown to you?\u00a0 Can you really tell one from another, especially by the end of the day?<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/20190916_165839-e1572531149185.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1394 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/20190916_165839-e1572531149185-225x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"410\" height=\"547\" srcset=\"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/20190916_165839-e1572531149185-225x300.jpg 225w, http:\/\/powertasting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/20190916_165839-e1572531149185-768x1024.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 410px) 100vw, 410px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Let\u2019s start with the best news: there are better Champagnes but there are no bad ones.\u00a0 To paraphrase Mae West, when Champagne is good it\u2019s great and when it\u2019s bad it\u2019s still good.\u00a0 There is so much to learn when wine tasting in Champagne, and we\u2019d like to start you off with a few tips.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/20190915_161135.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1395 aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/20190915_161135-300x146.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"623\" height=\"303\" srcset=\"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/20190915_161135-300x146.jpg 300w, http:\/\/powertasting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/20190915_161135-768x373.jpg 768w, http:\/\/powertasting.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/20190915_161135-1024x498.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 623px) 100vw, 623px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Don\u2019t try to do too much at one time.<\/strong> Champagne is a pretty big place so don\u2019t try to drive all over in an attempt to see it all.\u00a0 You will fail and you\u2019ll lose a lot of time driving around.\u00a0 It\u2019s best to focus on one place at a time.\u00a0 So a day in <a href=\"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1401\">Reims<\/a> can include <a href=\"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1388\">Taittinger<\/a>, Mumms and Veuve Cliquot, plus time for lunch and the cathedral.\u00a0 A day in \u00c9pernay (Mo\u00ebt &amp; Chandon, Perrier-Jou\u00ebt and lots of less well-known houses) must include a stroll down the Avenue de Champagne.\u00a0 And it\u2019s a good idea to devote a day to visiting some Champagne houses out in the countryside.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Take a tour.<\/strong> Very few Champagne houses offer you the chance to watch their wines being made.\u00a0 They do tour you around their cellars, where they store and age their wines.\u00a0 There they will explain the wine making process that makes sparkling wines unique.\u00a0 But quite honestly, if you\u2019ve seen one cave, you\u2019ve seen them all: long holes in the ground with a lot of bottles in them.\u00a0 It\u2019s a good experience to see a Champagne cellar.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Take advantage of the smaller Champagne houses.<\/strong> The big ones often aren\u2019t open to the public at all and if they are, a tour plus tasting can be expensive.\u00a0 And you rarely get to taste their top wines.\u00a0 Especially in the larger towns, you can walk in, order a glass of Champagne (even their best) for 10 euros or less and sit in a pleasant courtyard enjoying it.\u00a0 Out in the country, you can do the same thing but you\u2019ll look at the vineyards while you sip.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Do some comparison tasting.<\/strong> There are many bars where you can order a variety of Champagnes.\u00a0 In general, they tend to have the smaller producers although we have tasted Mo\u00ebt &amp; Chandon and Pol Roger side by side.\u00a0 There are so many comparisons to be made that you can, for instance hone your appreciation of <em>Blanc de Noirs<\/em> or contrast those with <em>Blanc de Blancs<\/em>.\u00a0 And you don\u2019t have to get behind a wheel to try several different Champagnes, you just walk around.<\/li>\n<li>All the rules for managing alcohol apply in Champagne as much as anywhere else.\u00a0 (However, the alcohol levels in Champagne tend to be lower, so you can have a bit more freedom.)\u00a0 You need to put some food in your stomach.\u00a0 In almost every restaurant, you can get champagne by the glass with your meal.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>With thousands of Champagnes to choose from, wine tasting in that region may feel overwhelming.\u00a0 Where do you start?\u00a0 How many can you taste?\u00a0 Should you stick with Champagnes that you know or be adventurous and try a few glasses from producers unknown to you?\u00a0 Can you really tell one from another, especially by the &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1393\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Champagne \u2013 Wine Tasting<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1393"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1393"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1393\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1409,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1393\/revisions\/1409"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}