Champagne series part one: Where it is (and where the major houses are)

It is with great pleasure that hospitality improvement begins to delve into arguably the most illustrious beverage that exists on the planet, the wonderful sparkling wine, known as “bubbles” right through to the premier class of the grape, known as Champagne.

For the record, Champagne refers to the wine produced in the northeast “historical” province of France, approximately 100 miles east of Paris.

Bear with me, as the next paragraph or two will sound confusing, as the French refer to their geographic areas a little differently to other countries.

The area itself (the old province of Champagne) is now known as Champagne-Ardenne, and is one of the 26 regions (22 of which are situated in France, four are overseas) of France. Within its borders are four departments (the areas within a region), that of Aube, Ardennes, Haute-Marne, and Marne.

The most notable department is Marne, containing the bulk of the Champagne vineyards that are famous around the world. Within Marne is the sub-prefectures (the area within a department!) of Épernay, Reims, Sainte-Menehould and Vitry-le-Francois.

Épernay is regarded as the central “entrepot” of champagne (meaning literally warehouse or trading post), or more informally regarded to as the capital of Champagne. The most famous street in the city is the Avenue de Champagne, where most of the leading producers have a significant manifestation.

The major champagne houses based in Épernay are (with their premium label, or Cuvee de prestige):

Besserat de Bellefon - Cuvée des Moines
Boizel - Joyau de France
Charles Lafitte - Orgueil de France
De Castellane - Commodore
Gauthier - Grande Réserve Brut
Heidsieck & Co Monopole - Diamant Bleu
Moët & Chandon - Dom Pérignon
Perrier-Jouët - Belle Époque
Pol Roger - Sir Winston Churchill

Reims, the largest city in the region, is most famous for its cathedral where it served for the coronation of French kings.

Other sources (it is not official) regard Reims as the capital of Champagne given that it is the largest city in the area. There are approximately 200,000 people in the city. But most of the big champagne houses, regarded to as les grandes marques, have their headquarters in the city.

The major champagne houses based in Reims are:

Bruno Paillard - Nec Plus Ultra
Chanoine Frères - Gamme Tsarine
Charles de Cazanove - Stradivarius
Charles Heidsieck - Blanc des Millénaires
Henri Abelé - Sourire de Reims
Henriot - Cuvée des Enchanteleurs
Krug - Krug (Vintage) and Clos du Mesnil
Lanson - Noble Cuvée
Louis Roederer - Cristal
Mumm - Mumm de Cramant
Piper-Heidsieck - Rare
Pommery - Cuvée Lyesse
Taittinger - Comtes de Champagne
Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin - La Grande Dame

The third town of the “holy trinity” if you were is the small town of Ay. The home of many major champagne houses including:

Ayala - Grande Cuvée
Bollinger - Vieilles Vignes Françaises (Vintage) and R.D. (Récemment Dégorgé)
Deutz - Amour de Deutz
Gosset - Celebris (Vintage) and Grand Millésime

Other regions (or communes as they are called in France [a commune is the lowest administrative level with regions being the highest] but a commune could effectively be a small village of 50 people, right up to Paris itself, which is classed as such!) include:

Mareuil-sur-Ay, which is home to the famous house Billecart-Salmon
Ludes which houses the Canard-Duchêne brand
Chigny-les-Roses, home of the Canard-Duchêne house
Urville, which has the family owned house Drappier
Tours-sur-Marne, home of Laurent-Perrier
Buxeuil, home of Moutard-Diligent
Chouilly, where the Nicolas Feuillatte house is located (one of the youngest houses)
Rilly-la-Montagne, where Vilmart is located
 
In part two of the Champagne series, we will look at the history of the famous region and wine