Mimosas

[Masuri]

So, I am going to some fancy-pants brunch on Sunday and I need to bring champagne to make mimosas. Anyone got a brand of champagne that goes particularly well with orange juice?

[Azrael]

Go to a liquor store with a large selection, figure out how much you want to spend on the bottle of champagne ...

Then don't buy champagne. If you aim for a Spanish or French sparkling wine at the same price, and you'll almost certainly find a better bottle. Plus, unless you're brunching with wine snobs they won't be able to taste the subtle differences and will only be pleased with how (surprisingly!) good it tastes. Just remember, these wines aren't champagne knock offs. They are their own breed.

Californian sparkling wines are often trying to imitate champagne. And while they're good, they're just not *as* good, compared to the original.

Either way, it's being mixed with orange juice ...

[PictureSarah]

I can't speak to California sparkling wines in particular, but California wines (reds at the very least) have been beating French wines since the 70s. I heard a thing on NPR once about it, and in blind tests even French judges have placed California wines higher, which has resulted in death threats against California vintners. Not the same story, but along the same lines:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/europ ... 79642.html

[Azrael]

Eh, I worded that badly, and it really only applied to champagne specifically. The issue is when Region X is trying to make a wine similar to Famous Region Y. Unless they manage to match the output exactly (which I think is probably a geographical impossibility) then Region X is going to be considered inferior, because it's trying to match Y, but can't quite get there.


In this case non-champagne French and Spanish wines are trying to be unique in order to differentiate themselves. And a lot -- not all -- of Californian sparkling wines are more champagne-like.