May 7, 2012 · Team HG
…but then the wine has to be tasty and affordable. We are becoming more creative and looking for pleasant alternatives.
Champagne is delicious – at least, it makes me very happy – but it is of course an extra treat when I can buy two bottles for the same price of a sparkling wine comparable to a decent basic Champagne. For did you know that excellent sparkling wines are also made outside the Champagne region? Less well known is that in Limoux, they claim to have been the first to produce sparkling wine using the Champenoise method.
Wine producer Jean Louis Denois (formerly active in Champagne) produces this fine sparkling white wine from Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. The grapes grow in the highest vineyards of the Languedoc, resulting in a wine of great finesse and freshness. After the first fermentation (in oak barrels), a second fermentation follows, along with 18 months of aging in this bottle (characteristic of the méthode champenoise). On the “date de dégorgement”, the wine is fitted with a champagne cork and sold.
Well, it's actually not that bad!
Author: W. Snaak www.josbeeres.nl / HG
Column Wietze Snaak – Jos Beeres Wine Merchant
