Berger: Sparklers often an overlooked joy

One of the world’s great wine paradoxes is that a delicate, subtle, evanescent, food-oriented wine is the one most often used to toast major horse and auto race victors, weddings, New Year’s Eves, World Series, and other events of drama and excitement.

It’s the wine of fireworks.

But realistically, there is very little excitement in the best Champagnes, which emanate from the district of that name in France.

Unlike the most evocative red wines, there is not much alcohol, no oak flavors, and not much concentration in bubblies. Most are made with grapes that when picked are considered a bit under-ripe, and they make a wine that, at its most sublime, is quiet in its aromas and tastes.

There is nothing as loud as an amped-up chardonnay here, even though many of the world’s top bubblies are made using chardonnay.

Most real French Champagnes are not viewed as action-adventure flicks, but drawing-room dramas - wines for introspection and discussion in which consumers try to capture the subtleties and nuances of early picked grapes.

And for various reasons, Champagne is expensive, partly as a result of expensive grapes from low-yielding acreage, and an arduous, time-consuming production process.

Because of its high price, many Americans reserve French Champagne consumption for the very moments when its subtleties will not be evident: at times when people are cheering and celebrating some event that has nothing to do with subtle contemplation.

The greatest Champagnes I have ever tasted were all in the company of sober wine lovers who chatted about the vintage, the rainfall, the dosage (the tiny bit of sugar used to make the wine tasty rather than simply austere) and the house’s style.

That last factor is seen as important since all of the great Champagne houses, from, Moët to Salon, Bollinger to Ayala, Krug to Taittinger, Perrier-Jouet to Henriot, have styles that define them.

A few years ago, I attended a dinner at La Toque, Ken Frank’s great Napa destination dining establishment. Guests were greeted with a reception wine of Roederer Cristal, one of the most heralded of all Champagnes.

A friend asked me how I liked the wine.

I loved it, I said, but added, “Uh, it’s not really very much Cristal in style, is it?” He agreed.

No, I wasn’t exploring a gift equine’s oral cavity as much as simply commenting on the fact that Cristal is often one thing, and this was something else. It was still awesome!

Considering that a bottle of Cristal would set you back somewhere north of 150 bucks a bottle, are there any other sparklers that approach Champagne in quality at a fairer price?

Well, the bubbles alone do not make much like Champagne, so that leaves out wines as popular and reasonably priced as Italian Prosecco and Spanish Cava. As good a value as they can be, none of it makes it to even modest Champagne level.

Champagne purists would also denigrate the sparklers of California. However, in the last decade or so, without much fanfare, California bubbly houses (many of them French-owned) are making ever greater strides toward the quality level of excellent Champagne, albeit without some of Champagne’s complex elements.

Literally a dozen California sparkling houses, topped by eight or so great producers, are making such stellar sparkling wines that even I am amazed by their excellence.

It all began exactly 50 years ago when Jack and Jamie Davies released their 1965 sparkling wine at then-nascent Schramsberg.

Yes, there had been earlier bubbly efforts, including those of Paul Masson, but until the Davies’s efforts in Napa, nothing ever came close to Champagne.

Lately we have seen such amazing sparkling wines from California that prices for the best are reaching $30 to $40. That would get you a middling French Champagne, but in California it’s a top-of-the-line beauty.

Even in the $15 to $20 price range, sensational California bubblies are available, and the amazing thing is that prices for them are a lot less in many cases than they are for mediocre chardonnays, and they go with meals far better than do most chardonnays.

Now that we are well past the wedding/graduation season of June and well before the holidays of December, sparkling wine sales are rather flat (no pun intended), so prices are soft.

Try a California bubbly. You might be surprised how good it is. You can always celebrate that it’s Wednesday.

Wine of the Week: Non-vintage Gloria Ferrer Brut, Sonoma County ($20) - This Spanish-owned (Freixenet) producer is one of the nation’s quality leaders with its sparklings, and this reliable and strikingly aromatic wine has a load of citrusy fruit, perfect balance to go with food, and national availability. Often seen closer to $15. A steal.

Sonoma County resident Dan Berger publishes “Vintage Experiences,” a weekly wine newsletter. Write to him at winenut@gmail.com.