Wine Club Newsletter - December 2010
December 2010 Wine Selections
Coming Soon
Coming Soon
The Gary Parker Collection
Coming Soon
Champagne, Historical Marketing
Holiday Greetings, WineSellar Wine Club Members!
Seeing how it’s the holiday season, I thought offering some information on Champagne as well as some interesting facts would be appropriate and entertaining.
Here is wishing you and yours all the best for the holiday season, and for a great 2011!
Champagne, Historical Marketing
Of all the wines, Champagne has a unique story to tell. The sparkling bubbles of Champagne have intrigued kings, emperors, rock stars and the common man alike and have helped Champagne become an integral part of every celebration. Champagne is produced exclusively within the Champagne region of France, from which it takes its name. The bubbles in the golden fizzy drink seem to match the effervescent celebrating spirit of a festive occasion.
The popularity of Champagne is attributed to the success of the wine producers in marketing the drink. Champagne first became famous because of its association with the anointment of the French kings. The message of this unique sparkling wine from Champagne was spread by royalty throughout Europe, and became associated with luxury and power.
The wine-makers of those times invested considerable energy to creating a history and identity for their wine and promoted it on all royal occasions. They succeeded to a large extent through packaging and advertising in associating champagne with high luxury, festivities and rites of passage. An emerging middle class helped put Champagne as a symbol of affluence as it was looking for ways to spend its money to acquire status symbols.
Though hugely successful, the wine-manufacturers also portrayed Champagne as a luxury enjoyable by anyone, for any occasion. Due to this strategy, by the turn of the twentieth century, the majority of Champagne drinkers were middle class.
Champagne is the most famous example of a blend. There are typically three kinds, Blanc de blancs, which is white champagne from white grapes, (Chardonnay) Blanc de noirs are white Champagnes made only from select black grape varieties Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier) and Pink or rose Champagnes, made from a blend of grapes which include white and black grapes.
The wine is typically light in color even if it is produced with dark grapes, because the juice is extracted from the grapes using a gentle process that minimizes the amount of time the juice spends in contact with the skins, and at the most it acquires a full golden color. Besides color, not allowing the skins and stems to soak in the juice also reduces the amount of tannin in the Champagne. Tannin has a mouth drying quality that causes the wine to feel firm and this has been avoided in the making of this drink making it a wonderfully light drink to be enjoyed by anyone, anywhere.
Buried Bubbles under the Sea
On November 3rd, 1916, two years into the First World War, a ship called the Jonkoping was on its way to Finland, carrying wines bound for Tsar Nicolas II in St Petersburg. On this fateful night it was sunken by a German submarine and came to rest at the bottom of the ocean just off the coast of Finland.
The wreck and its contents lay largely forgotten until it was discovered by a team of divers in 1997. The following year the wreck was lifted and it was found that its expensive cargo of Burgundy wines and Cognac had not survived eighty-two years of submersion. The champagne it was carrying however, had survived.
Two thousand bottles of Piper Heidsieck Monopole 1907 were recovered, and tasters found that the champagne had been beautifully preserved and was of exceptional quality. A quantity of the bottles were quickly purchased by the Ritz Carlton hotel in Moscow which proudly announced on its website that ten of them were available to purchase from August 2008.
Misconceptions About the Price of the Piper Heidsieck Monopole 1907
This champagne has appeared on many blogs and "Top Ten Most Expensive Wine Lists" on the internet and in the press. Some of them claim that a bottle of the champagne is being sold for $275,000 but the Ritz Carlton's Director of Public Relations has confirmed that this is incorrect.
In correspondence with the author, Sergey Logvinov confirms the price for sale is 880,000 RUB (approximately 35,000 USD) and dismisses the $275,000 price claim as "inaccurate" and the "result of some miscommunication outside of our hotel". He adds that there are still a few bottles available for purchase.
Can a Bottle of Champagne Ever be Worth 35,000 USD?
Some people will question the value of the once-shipwrecked bottles of Piper Heidsieck Monopole. But to many others, their legend far outstrips the price. People buy into the history of the bottles. They enjoy stories of the sinking of the ship and that these bottles lay undisturbed on the floor of the cold ocean for some eighty years. They lay there through two World Wars, the advent of the Rock n' Roll era and the invention of the Internet. And when they were retreived from their icy depths, the champagne was not just "drinkable", but was found to have matured fully.
Jun 21, 2010 Jo Romero
Interesting Facts on Champagne
Many, from Napoleon to Bette Davis, have championed Champagne - vivacious, social, and elegant, it is truly one of the most pleasurable wines one can serve. The next time you pop the cork off a bottle of bubbly, consider, for a moment, these intriguing facts:
- Wine can only be labeled "champagne" if is made in the Champagne region of northeastern France. If a sparkling wine is produced elsewhere using the traditional French method, credit must be given to the "methode champenoise" on the label. The three traditional grapes used to make champagne are the Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, and Pinot Meunier, all which grow in the region. True champagne, as opposed to other sparkling wines, has to have developed bubbles by undergoing the fermentation process twice: once in barrels and again in bottles.
- Dom Perignon, a Benedictine monk at the Abbey of Hautvillers, is considered to have invented champagne. He allowed the carbon dioxide to build up in the fermentation process, thus creating bubbles.
- There are 49 million bubbles in a 750ml bottle of champagne, give or take a few, as calculated by scientist Bill Lembeck, based on 5.5 atmospheres of pressure, when stored at 20 degrees Celsius.
- The pressure in a bottle of champagne is 90 pounds per square inch, about three times that in an automobile tire.
- Legend has it that the champagne "coupe" (a shallow, broad-rimmed goblet) was modeled in the shape of Marie Antoinette's breast, using wax moulds.
- The longest champagne cork flight in the world was 177 feet, 9 inches, set by American Heinrich Medicus in New York in 1988.
- A champagne cork leaves the bottle at a velocity of approximately 38-40 mph, but can pop out at as fast as100 mph.
- The world's largest champagne glass, unveiled at a festival in Spoleto, Italy, stands nearly 7 feet tall, and can hold the equivalent of 22 regular bottles (558 ounces) of champagne. That's a lot of bubbly!
- Marilyn Monroe is said to have once taken a bath in the bubbly. According to her biographer, it took 350 bottles to fill the tub. Try this at home.
- The official champagne of the Titanic was Heidsieck & Co Monopole Blue Top Champagne Brut. Rumor has it that a few bottles were brought up with the salvage recently, and still tasted great.
Chocolate Truffles
This is a relatively simple recipe, but the results are well appreciated by the recipients of this glorious little bite. The key is to use the finest chocolate you have, and to add the liqueur of your fancy. We have been serving these for nearly 20 years in the restaurant, and people always roll their eyes with pleasure. It would be a perfect New Year’s eve or an appropriate finale for a special holiday dinner with friends and family.
Ingredients:
- 12 oz. semi-sweet chocolate, chopped
- 3 oz. butter
- 1 cup cream
- 1/2 cup liqueur (Grand Marnier, Chambord, etc.)
Method:
1. Combine chocolate and butter in a bowl over simmering water to melt.
2. Add cream and liqueur.
3. Refrigerate until set.
4. Roll into balls and dust with cocoa before serving.