10 facts about bubbly: A primer for New Year’s Eve

New Year’s Eve is the time for Champagne and other bubblies to shine. But if you don’t know much about them, these intriguing celebratory drinks don’t have to be a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. Take a look at our primer of 10 bubbly facts, for tips on serving, determining quality and more. They may serve you well during your New Year’s Eve Zoom toasts with friends and family.

1. The best-shaped wine glass to play up the complex aromas in bubbly is the wide tulip or the white wine glass. The shape of these glasses best court the complex aromas, including yeast, brioche and biscuit. The flute doesn’t present the aromas nearly as well, although it is the best to preserve the bubbles. Meanwhile, the best glass for inexpensive bottlings is the coupe, popular in the 1950s, because the bubbles are quickly dispensed, making the bubbly taste softer and fruitier.

2. If a sparkler goes flat, you can toss it out. But if you’re an inventive type, have fun creating something new: you can make a spritzy sangria by adding bubbly gone flat to rum, Garnacha, apples and oranges.

3. Champagne is more expensive than prosecco because Champagne is made with the longer, more involved, more expensive traditional method, while prosecco is made in the shorter, inexpensive tank method. In the traditional method, also known as méthode Champenoise, bubbly is born right in the bottle during what is known as the secondary fermentation. Each bottle is its own winemaking vessel — it’s here that the yeast devours the sugar, releasing carbon dioxide that creates the bubbles. With prosecco, the tank is sealed in the secondary fermentation, to prevent carbon dioxide from escaping. The fizzy wine is then bottled and sealed.

4. While experts may disagree on the details, most agree three things are key to determining the quality of bubbly: complexity, pinpoint bubbles and crisp acidity.

5. Some of the best-known Champagne drinkers from history include Sir Winston Churchill, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Napoleon Bonaparte, Coco Chanel, Madame de Pompadour, Charles Dickens, Lord Byron, Honore de Balzac and Oscar Wilde.

6. A riddler is a person in a traditional sparkling wine house who twists, by hand, as many as 40,000 bottles of bubbly every day. This riddler turns the bottles to move the sediment toward the cork. The sediment collects during the secondary fermentation, and eventually it will be removed.

7. To the surprise of many, bubbly was a mistake, but perhaps it is one of the best mistakes ever made. Bubbly was born in Champagne, France, at the end of the 17th century; its bubbles were a result of the Champagne region’s cool temperatures, which would halt fermentation in the fall and unleash it again in the spring when the wines warmed up. Those instrumental in Champagne’s beginnings were not amused by the fizz and did everything they could to tame it, but as they couldn’t win their war with the bubble, over time they decided to make peace with it and ultimately celebrate it.

8. To ensure you’re buying top-rate bubbly, look for this wording on the label: “Traditional method” or “fermented in this bottle,” so you can find bottles that are made in the traditional method in which Champagne is produced. If you see a label that says “Charmat process,” beware. The sparkler’s secondary fermentation was in a big container or a tank and this process will create big soda-pop bubbles instead of the desired pinpoint bubbles, not to mention a less complex sparkler.

9. Bubbly producers have to be visionaries because they have to envision what the sparklers will taste like three to seven years down the road, with the evolution of alcohol gain, dosage (added sugar) and bubbles.

10. Contrary to popular belief, the best way to open a bottle of bubbly is not to pop the cork. It’s better to slowly ease out the cork, achieving an ideal “sigh” as the cork exits the bottle.

Here are the steps: Remove the foil covering the cork. Loosen the wire casing. Hold the cork, within the wire casing, in the palm of one hand. Twist the bottle with the other hand while holding the cork and the wire casing. The cork will come out of its own accord.

You can reach Wine Writer Peg Melnik at 707-521-5310 or peg.melnik@pressdemocrat.com.