Champagne
by Leyna O'Neill
Last weekend I went on a trip to the Champagne region of France. It was a trip organized by my school. It took about two and a half hours to drive there, but it was worth it. We got a tour of the Mumm house of Champagne. After a short flick, they took us down into their cellars where they explained the wine making process step by step. We also saw a whole lot of Champagne. It was really cool to see how intense the process is and just how much time goes into making the bottle that you buy.
Each bottle needs to be turned at different intervals to keep the yeast from hardening
After a free wine tasting at Mumm we went to lunch at a very nice french restaurant, everything was very fresh and delicious. I think there were about five courses, each one better than the last. And of course, there was Champagne. After a filling lunch we headed over to our second tasting at the Lallement house of Champagne. I liked this place better because it was much less institutionalized and on a much smaller scale. The man who gave us a tour was so enthusiastic about everything and you could tell that Champagne was his passion. This place was also better because they were much more generous with the bubbly! I think there were four or five different kinds and my glass was never empty. They were more than happy to keep the refills coming. Of course I couldn’t leave Champagne without buying a bottle, so I got a rose one, it was great.
At the Lallement House
It was really nice to see France outside of Paris. I wish I was going to be able to see more, especially of the south of France, but I don’t think I’ll have the time. Last night we went to a wine tasting/instruction at O Chateau which was phenomenal, but I guess I’ll have to put my new skills to use in Paris rather than the different wine regions we learned about, oh well! I’m off to Prague for a long weekend, more to come!
