The Emperor Edition — Champagne Explained

The time old adage that bigger is always better doesn’t necessarily apply to everything including our waistlines, queues for ice cream or debt, but it does apply to champagne vessels. The coveted ‘Magnum’ is double the quantity of a standard bottle and doubly impressive in contents. Everything about a magnum is sexy. The presence of the bottle on the table, the weight of the shape in your hands and the 'oohs and ahs' of your dinner party guests as you ‘pull out the big gun’. Nothing says party like a magnum of Champagne! But its not simply double the volume...

This is a hot topic at the moment and the term “grower champagne” is featuring on the best wine lists across the globe as well as high-end retailers. But what does it actually mean?  Our take on this is; historically speaking in champagne, the big houses (I’ll let your imagination work that out) had and still have hundreds of contracts in place with growers across the region, to secure supply for their industrious demands. For many years this suited the grower as it guaranteed a steady income. After generations of families fulfilling the big houses, at some point in their...

Non-vintage (NV) champagne is the most common category of champagne, so it's no surprise it is the most popular in Australia according to sales. It is as it says, a ‘non-vintage’ so not made from a singular year (vintage champagne) but instead is a blend several years of reserve wines (either in tank or barrel, some use a Solera system) to create a consistency that the consumer can identify with a certain style of the house. Non-Vintage is also the most difficult wine to make; contrary to popular belief and so draws upon the lion’s share of winemaking in any team....

All champagne is special, however some are more special than others.  Undoubtedly the magic starts with the long and illustrious history of the houses, followed by the unrelenting effort that goes into producing each bottle, which is aged for years in the long, cool, chalk cellars of the region. Add to the mix, the excitement-eliciting ‘pop’ of the cork and the gentle rising of millions of bubbles in every glass, and It’s no wonder many of us rightly feel that every single bottle of champagne is mother nature’s gift. Then... Enter the realm of the Prestige Cuvée and we can...