Let the corks fly free with these champagnes and sparkling wines

Here is a user’s guide to the best bubbles for this celebratory season.

Champagne and sparkling wine lifts spirits, soaks sorrows and generally makes life better.

At this time of year conversation is frequently punctuated by the distinctive sound of corks relinquishing the responsibility of keeping bubbles in bottles. But, while sales of champagne and sparkling wine spike at this time of year, there are 51 other weeks of the year where the stuff lifts spirits, soaks sorrows and generally makes life better.

Here are a few that have tickled my nose, and my fancy, during the last year.

1. Deviation Road Southcote Blanc de Noirs 2017, Adelaide Hills ($55)

Kate and Hamish Laurie live a life buoyed by bubbles. They deploy a dedicated — some might say obsessive — approach to producing high-end artisanal fizz from elevated sites across the Adelaide Hills.

This is the latest addition to their range, a cuvee built on pinot noir. It’s a beautiful bronze in the glass, redolent with crabapples, dried strawberries and spiced rhubarb. Its sinewy lines, fine sculpted frame and balletic balance stamp it clearly as another stellar release from what must surely now be recognised as Australia’s finest small sparkling producer.

2. Dormilona Clayface Pet-Nat 2019, Margaret River ($55)

The rise of Pet-Nat — or Petillent Naturel, to use the full title — has been the big wine trend of the year. These lo-fi bubblies are made using the ancient and rudimentary method of simply bottling the wine before primary fermentation is completed, the yeast action on the remaining sugars producing a slight fizz trapped in the bottle. Some can be delicious; others can be like the sweat dripping from a prized hog on a hot day.

Jo Perry makes the best Australian examples I’ve seen. This is chenin blanc grown organically in Wilyabrup, initially fermented in amphora, treated with considered nonchalance and bottled sans sulphur. Bruised cider apples, preserved lemons, classroom chalk and electric acidity make for a wild, funky, delicious wine.

3. House of Arras EJ Carr Late Disgorged 2004, Tasmania ($199)

Ed Carr is Australia’s sparkling wine Yoda, a man with a supernatural control of the fizzy Force. It’s appropriate his name adorns the label of the most ambitious wine released under the House of Arras label he created and defined. This is indulgent and expensive winemaking with the quality of the end product being the only thing that counts. Ten years on yeast lees have imparted labyrinthine layers of complexity, a descent into a deep cave that smells of grilling nuts, preserving citrus and small, smoky fires built on oyster middens. This wine has made the world reconsider what’s possible with Australian sparkling.

4. Louis Roederer Brut Nature NV 2012, Champagne ($180)

The addition at the time of bottling of a small dash of sugar solution known as liqueur d’expedition is one of the dark arts of sparkling wine production. The purpose of the process known as dosage is to slightly soften the sometime searing acidity inherent in great sparkling wine. But what happens when winemakers chose to forgo the dosage process? You then get wines that are as piercingly pure, thrillingly energetic and tightly coiled as this masterful effort from Roederer. This is the wine for those who think champagne should be a thrill ride. Salted citrus rind, cracking quartz, some spice and flint. This is champagne with its soul exposed.

5. Charles Heidsieck Blanc de Blancs NV, Champagne ($170)

The venerable house colloquially known as Charles arguably has been the best performer in Champagne in recent years, the quality across its entire output being the definition of punching above weight. It was with no small amount of excitement it added to the range this year, releasing a non-vintage 100 per cent chardonnay cuvee for the first time in seven decades. It doesn’t disappoint. The grace and beauty that defines all its wines is evident here in a poised wine that entwines the vigorous freshness of younger chardonnay material with a nougat softness coming from a wide selection of older reserve wines. Classic Charles in a new form.

6. Ruinart Blanc de Blancs NV, Champagne ($110)

All ships need safe harbours and this has been one of mine. As the first great Champagne house established nearly three centuries ago, Ruinart is the foundation stone of Champagne and this ele­gant cuvee has been my go-to blanc de blanc for years. It smells of fresh lemons squeezed on white peaches, soft whiffs of jasmine and gently grilled nuts. It’s an essay in elegance, pure and persistent, and finishes with a freshness that will see a bottle disappear in the blink of an eye. Always great.

7. Bollinger Rose NV, Champagne ($140)

Bollinger will always be Bollinger first and foremost, so don’t expect ethereal rose with a light footfall here. Bollinger understands the vinification of red wine from pinot noir vineyards around Verzenay and Ay better than most — it even produces a highly sought after dry red wine — so the addition of 5 per cent of red wine to a blend dominated by the pinots noir and meunier is beautifully handled in this wine and results in a robust and muscular rose of real depth and power. Wild strawberries, exotic spices, wisps of smoke. The rose champagne for those who wouldn’t ordinarily be seen dead with the stuff.

8. Demiere-Ansiot Blanc de Blancs Grand Cru NV, Champagne ($95)

A small grower from the village of Oger, just recently imported into Australia by the especially fussy Kate and Hamish Laurie from Deviation Road. That stamp of approval should be enough to guarantee purchase sight unseen, but once tasted the wine makes a strong case all by itself.

Crunchy and taut, packed tight with minerally elements reminiscent of crushed oyster shells and flint, with freshening citrus elements and hints of just baked sourdough.

A really exciting addition to the market.

9. Champagne Laherte Freres Les Vignes d’Autrefois 2013, Champagne ($140)

Pinot meunier is, in terms of plantings and, somewhat unfairly, reputation, a distant third behind chardonnay and pinot noir in the champagne hierarchy, but in the rare occasions it stands alone, it can do wonderful things. This is the product of a single four-tonne press of pinot meunier grapes from biodynamic vineyards planted in the years immediately after World War II, and is aged for seven months in old burgundy barrels before secondary fermentation and 30 months in bottle on yeast lees. The wine is exuberantly driven by bright red fruits — think cranberries and redcurrants — with a fine saline seam providing intrigue and complexity. This will require some seeking out but is well worth the effort.

10. Taittinger Comtes de Champagne Blanc de Blanc 2007, Champagne ($300)

Australia is a strong champagne market for many reasons, not least of which is the thirst Australian winemakers have for the stuff. If there was one champagne drunk by winemakers more than any other, it would the glorious Comtes.

This is the finest flowering of the blanc de blanc style, a wine of staggering beauty, intricately etched detail and the kind of elegance that takes the breath away. It’s an almost endless maze of nougat and white peaches, shortcrust pastry and preserved lemons, everything aligned and harmonious. There’s a reason an earlier vintage is what I chose to toast the birth of my first child.

11. Pol Roger Sir Winston Churchill 2008, Champagne ($350)

My first daughter was anointed with Comtes but when my son was born there was never a thought for any other wine by Winnie. Pol Roger’s homage to the great wartime leader is a wine well up to that daunting task, and this particular vintage may just be one of the finest it has ever made. The blend, as is the house style, favours the muscular pinots noir and meunier, with chardonnay making up a portion just shy of 25 per cent. The result is a wine of stature and unwavering focus, rippling with elements of sourdough, pressed white flowers, beeswax and lemon pith. It’s certainly not cheap, but great leadership always comes at a cost. You might save yourself a few bucks at duty free coming back from Hawaii.