Oh, the places we will go.

Wednesday, May 15, 2013

G.H. Mumm Champagne is "only the best!"

"Why do I drink Champagne for breakfast? Doesn't everyone?"

Noel Coward

Every day should start with a glass (or two) of champagne.

How do I know this? Because this is how we started our last day in Reims and it was awesome.

(I'm American so I'm allowed to use that word. Often.)

We had tried to visit the the House of G.H. Mumm when we arrived on Saturday evening,

but they were all booked up. So we made reservations for Monday morning at 9:30.

Now with the time difference it was 8:30am back in the UK and

it was the weekend that the clocks changed, so our body clocks were set at 7:30am.

I've mentioned that the four of us are champagne troopers (well, except Matt as he was the DD for the weekend) so the early call was clearly not a problem.

It was the perfect way to start the day and added a giggly, golden tint to our last day.

G.H. Mumm was founded in 1827 by a family of German winemakers from the Rhine Valley and is now owned by Pernod Ricard. This champagne is used to celebrate momentous sporting events all over the world including Formula 1 Racing. The motto of the house has always been "only the best."

By this time the caves were familiar and we'd heard all about the process of making champagne. But, I'm glad we visited. It was a smaller group (good morning) and our English Speaking tour guide did a great job. We learned a little more about the various grapes that are used. And they also have many examples of tools and techniques that were used in the past. I think the tour was about €24 and included two glasses of champagne.

And then to our favorite part of the tours... the tasting!!!

Mumm was my favorite champagne of the four houses that we toured,

with Moet & Chandon a very close second.

It was light and smooth and bubbly and nummy!

(How do you like the use of my descriptive words there? I should write for a wine magazine, yes?)

We bought a bottle of Brut that is sitting in my fridge calling out to me.
We must find some excuse to break it out. I think "It's Wednesday" is good enough, don't you?

"One holds a bottle of red wine by the neck, a woman by the waist,

and a bottle of Champagne by the derriere."

And that's the end of our tour of the Champagne district of France.

It was such a fantastic weekend! I would highly recommend it.

Quick tips:

Do your research. This one needs to be preplanned.

Visit both the larger and the smaller houses.

Pre-book your champagne house visits. It's rare to just be able to walk in and get a tour.

Each tour is about two hours so leave yourself plenty of time.

Three a day is a good number, morning, afternoon & early evening.

The houses are all spread out, so you will need a car unless you book a bus tour.

Drink responsibly and have a designated driver.

Lastly, take some wonderful friends along with you!

It will make all the difference in the world!

One last thing, before we're done.

Be sure to ask your bartender at the hotel bar to saber a champagne bottle for you.

Best party trick ever!

(I would show you the video but ~~all you can hear is my tipsy giggle~~ the lighting is bad.)

And he didn't even need a fancy saber and gloves like in the photo above.

He just used the rim of a metal cocktail shaker.

Here's how to do it if you're interested.

Now all of you should go celebrate Wednesday with a bottle of champagne!

Cheers, my friends.

The rest of the Champagne District posts:

Champagne Wishes

Moët & Chandon

Castellane

Taittinger

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Monday, May 13, 2013

Taittinger Champagne House in Reims

We're back from Portugal and it was fabulous!

I'm editing the photos and hope to post about our trip next week.

(And don't worry, I haven't forgotten about Spain and Morocco, I'm just getting geared up.

There is so much to write about so that will be an upcoming project.)

Thank you so much for the supportive comments on my Friday post.

I think a few days in the sun was just what I needed.

I had a good cry one night. (Mother's Day away from your

mother AND daughter just really, really, really sucks!)

I did have one more crazy, angry dream where I beat up a coworker and had to go to jail!

(Seriously? What kind of wackadoodle dream is that?)

But last night I dreamed about yummy, fluffy cupcakes.

(They were being withheld from me,

which made me angry but I didn't scream or harm anyone.)

So all in all, I think things are getting better.

I'm sure a dream interpreter would have ~~me committed~~ a field day.

But for now let's forget about my crazy dreams and talk some more about the bubbly stuff.

As we were planning our weekend in the champagne district, we found it a bit challenging to discern the who, what, when and where of all of the houses. Each one has very different opening times, rates and reservation requirements. We had contacted about five ahead of time and were able to schedule visits with two of them on Sunday morning in Epernay.

After Castellane, we were left to wing it for the rest of our visit. I'd read that visiting two houses in a day is a good goal. But after finishing up with #2, we realized we definitely had a third visit in us (champagne troopers, we are). We quickly got on the phone to see if we had any more options. We called Taittinger and had just enough time to get back to Reims for their last tour of the day.

The only catch was that the tour was in French. Three of the four of us do very well with French (I'll let you guess who is the odd one out), and we'd already heard about the process a few times so it really wasn't too much of a problem. The tour group was much bigger but the caves are fantastic and well worth a visit.

The 4th century Roman chalk quarry, later became the cellars of the Saint Nicaise Abbey. The abbey was destroyed during the French Revolution, but the vaults and caves below are now the champagne caves of Taittinger. Be on the lookout out for faces watching you from the walls. If only they could talk, I'm sure they would tell quite a story.

In the photo above, you can see just one of the vaults and how deep it is. This vault holds 100,000 bottles of champagne that have each carefully placed by hand. In the photo below you see the racks that are used to turn and tilt the bottles each day, again by hand, to gently coax the sediment into the necks of the bottles for disgorgement. This process takes several months. Did you watch the video about the process? Pretty interesting, huh?