Prosecco vs. Champagne

As any self-respected woman, I’ve always started my dinner parties with Champagne.

Naturally, I’d get a decent bottle to celebrate whatever the occasion was but even so, I just couldn’t get into drinking it for the whole night. There was something missing.

Cue in, the “Prosecco”!

Though is usually less expensive than the Champagne, the Prosecco is definitely not the poor man’s Champagne. It’s made in a different way, comes from different countries, etc.

Similarities – there’s only one

Both Prosecco  and Champagne are sparkling wines that take their name from the specific geographic regions they’re made in – and where wine regulators get testy if anyone outside that area uses that name to make a similar wine.

Differences between Prosecco and Champagne

The way it’s made

• Champagne is produced using a costly method i.e. the Traditional Method. It ferments first in a wooden barrel, and then in the bottle you buy it in. The secondary fermentation takes place in individual bottles which takes time too and jacks up the price. (Please note – cheap Champagne pumps the carbon dioxide into the wine to create bubbles. Soda is made in a similar way.)

• Prosecco is simply a sparkling wine produced using an affordable method called the Tank Method (Charmat Method). The secondary fermentation takes place in steel enamel-covered tanks rather than in the individual bottles (like the Champagne) and the resulting fizz is then bottled under pressure in a continuous process.

Grapes used

• Prosecco is made from the Glera grape (it has to have at least 85% of it in the bottle). It originates in Prosecco, Italy, a Northern Italian village about a half hour from Venice (). Some claim the grape has been cultivated since Roman times, but the first written account of the Glera grape dates back to 1772.

• Champagne can only be made from three grapes in any combination: Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, and Pinot Meunier.

Storage

• You can store Champagne for a few years (decades if you buy the expensive stuff)
• Prosecco is meant to be gone in a couple of months (so when someone gives it to you – open it and drink it!)

So there you are my lovely people. Do you feel like you know more? I suppose it doesn’t really matter. Just open that bottle of Prosecco and enjoy it. Because you know what?

A brunch without a Prosecco is just a sad, late breakfast.

A lunch without a Prosecco is just an empty gossip.

A dinner without a Prosecco is like sex you can’t tell your friends about. Because every good story starts with: “I poured him a glass of Prosecco and then he….”

Right? 😉

It’s Prosecco o’clock somewhere. Cheers!