Champagne Uncorked: Your Guide to Champagne Varieties | Wine Ark

Champagne is more than a celebratory bubbly — it’s a versatile and nuanced wine with a world of styles, sweetness levels, and ageing potential. Whether it’s the refined bubbles of a vintage Blanc de Blancs or the rich complexity of a prestige cuvée, each bottle tells a story of craftsmanship, terroir, and time-honoured tradition. But with so many styles to choose from — brut, sec and doux — how do you know which suits your palate and which is ideal for trading? And just as important, how to store French champagne to preserve its delicate effervescence?

In this guide, we explore the various types of Champagne and offer expert insights on proper wine storage. Whether you’re a casual drinker or a budding collector, these tips will help you select and store Champagne that will maintain or even improve in quality over time.

What is Champagne?

Champagne is a prestigious sparkling wine hailing exclusively from France’s renowned Champagne region to strict appellation rules, ensuring authenticity and quality. While every winemaker’s recipe is different, creating vastly different, nuanced types of Champagne, Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée (AOH) guidelines dictate where the wine can be produced to call itself a Champagne. It also prescribes where the grapes can be sourced from and the grape pressing methods, and it requires secondary fermentation to create its trademark effervescence or carbonation.

What grapes are used in Champagne?

The Champagne region’s cool climate and chalky limestone soils play a key role in shaping the wine’s distinct freshness, minerality, and refined acidity. Three primary grape varieties define Champagne’s identity, including Chardonnay, which brings acidity and age-worthiness; Pinot Noir, which adds structure, depth, and light notes of red fruit; and Pinot Meunier, which enhances its body, fruitiness, and early-drinking appeal. Less typically and on a smaller scale, Pinot blanc, Fromenteau, Arbane, and Petit Meslier are also vinified.

What does Champagne taste like?

Champagne offers a vibrant interplay of freshness, fruit, and depth, shaped by its terroir and production method — you can savour a spectrum of flavours, including:

• Citrus and tree fruit: Pear, apricot, lemon and orange
• Red and dried fruit: Strawberries, cherries, figs and raisins
• Floral and herbal: Chamomile, honeysuckle and almond
• Earthy: Smoke and chalk dust
• Oak (from the barrel): Vanilla, marzipan and pastry

The best Champagnes are complex, and feature layered flavour notes to capture their brilliance. Their primary flavours, like fruit, honey, and chalk, are the most obvious to taste and come from the grapes. Meanwhile, creamy secondary flavours arise during the fermentation process. When your French champagne has been aged in an optimal environment, notes of pastries like brioche, biscotti, and hazelnut can develop.  

Champagne by Sweetness Levels 

For people new to fine wines or those who are unaccustomed to the different types and varietals, there is always a question of whether Champagne is bitter or sweet. However, French Champagnes are classified by their dosage — the process of adding a sugary liqueur containing 0 to 50g of sugar per litre — sometimes, it can be more, to balance the wine’s acidity and set its sweetness level. The type and amount of dosage can influence the complexity of flavour and classification as some producers stick to a fixed formula across vintages to maintain a “house” style, while others adjust it to enhance each Champagne’s unique profile. 

The various styles of Champagne can include: 

• Brut Nature Champagne

Almost no sugar (<3g per litre) for an exceptionally pure, bone-dry profile and crisp finish. Its laser-sharp acidity, minerality, and pure expression of terroir make Brut Nature Champagnes ideal as an aperitif, pairing wonderfully with light seafood, sushi, and canapés. 

• Extra Brut Champagne, (0–6g/L) – A Hint of Softness, Still Bracingly Dry

Slightly sweeter than Brut Nature (up to 6g per litre) but still bracingly dry, extra brut styles offer a crisp taste where notes of fruit become more prominent and a balanced palate that complements richer dishes like shellfish, French dishes (of course) and creamy risottos. 

• Brut Champagne

The most popular style (<12g per litre), French brut Champagnes more equally balances a dry profile with a sweet taste. With just enough sugar to soften Champagne’s natural acidity, it remains crisp and refreshing and is versatile enough to pair with everything from mature cheeses to fried foods. 

• Extra Sec, Sec, Demi-Sec, and Doux Champagne

On the other side of the scale, extra sec (12–17g/L), sec (17–32g/L), demi-sec (32–50g/L) and doux (over 50g/L) Champagnes range from medium-dry to gently off-dry with a rounded palate or being a true dessert wine. These expressions are suited to different palates and dish pairings, from spicy cuisines and aged cheeses to decadent treats. 

Each sweetness level is crafted from a blend of Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, and Pinot Meunier, with adjustments made during production to create the final taste.  

The Different Types of Champagne 

Beyond sweetness, Champagne’s style is influenced by the grape varieties and production methods: 

• Blanc de Blancs Champagne

Otherwise known as white from white, they are made solely from Chardonnay grapes to showcase bright citrus notes and a floral aroma. Their lively acidity and chalky minerality make them the perfect pairing for seafood and creamy cheeses.

• Blanc de Noirs Champagne

Translated to black from white, blanc de noirs Champagnes are crafted exclusively from dark-skinned grapes like Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier. The skins are removed during pressing, preserving their golden hue while contributing to a fuller body with red fruit and complex aromas. Offering a structured flavour profile, blanc de noirs Champagnes complement charcuterie boards, poultry, and rich dishes indulged with truffles.

• Rosé Champagne

A blended Champagne that typically uses red wine maceration to develop its signature pink hue and lively red berry notes. Rosé Champagne’s bright acidity and fruit-forward flavour make it incredibly versatile, pairing well with grilled seafood, roasted duck, and even spicy Asian cuisine.

Champagne Ageing Categories 

Champagne’s character also evolves with age. The three main categories include: 

• Non-Vintage Champagne

A blend of grapes from several years, designed to maintain a consistent house style. Best enjoyed within 15–18 months. Depending on your label’s quality, they are considered a reliable, well-crafted style suitable for casual celebrations, apéritifs, and as an everyday indulgence. 

• Vintage Champagne

Made from a single exceptional year and aged for at least three years, these bottles develop unique complexities over time and store beautifully. During their peak drinking window, vintage Champagnes are ideal for celebrating special occasions and fine dining, while collectors may choose these styles to add to their wine cellars for long-term ageing. 

• Multi-Vintage Champagne

Blending wines from different years creates an enduring style, offering consistency while balancing varying characteristics. Unlike non-vintage Champagnes, which prioritise consistency, multi-vintage styles enable winemakers to experiment to create a deeper, more complex flavour profile. This also helps eliminate the limitations of a single vintage — think Krug Grand Cuvee.

Champagnes, particularly premium vintage and prestige cuvées, can improve with proper long-term storage. However, for non-vintage blends, preserving their freshness is often the goal. 

Wine Storage: Key to Unlocking Your Champagne’s Potential 

With Champagne being such a delicate wine, how you cellar your wine can make the biggest impact on its flavour and value. This is especially true if you are looking to hold these wines for an extended period, more so if your goal is to trade them.

The first question a buyer of vintage-aged Champagne will ask is, where has this been stored? Knowing the wine’s provenance is imperative to maintaining its climate-controlled custodial journey. It’s why enthusiasts and collectors look to offsite professional wine storage to secure their collections. At Wine Ark, we specialise in maintaining climate-controlled wine cellars, where light, temperature, humidity, and even vibrations are controlled, creating the perfect environment to rehome our clients’ prized champagne collections.

This precise level of control has allowed Wine Ark to become the largest and most trusted provider of wine storage in Australia. It’s also where many people learn and start their wine collections. It’s no wonder that many collectors ask what to look for when buying Champagne online. 

John Cuff, Head Keeper of the Bottles at Wine Ark, said, “When considering collecting champagne, and if the budget allows, look towards magnums. While regular 750ml bottles store well, a large format bottle is ideal.” This is due to the ratio of wine to surface area, which allows for a slower, more even maturation of the wine and a finer, enduring flow of bubbles.

What to look for when buying Champagne

In the past, the brands or Champagne houses were more important in guiding a collector’s purchasing decisions. However, more recently, the vintage has been more prominent. Champagnes from 2002, 2006, 2008, and 2012 are extremely sought after and command increased prices from release, especially those with guaranteed provenance. 

Before you buy wine online or from a store, auction or private sale, make sure you choose a reliable wine merchant or retailer. You would not want to risk purchasing a bottle of 2002 Salon that has been standing upright on display in bright light and exposed to varying temperatures for 10 years. The easier option is to entrust the process to a company like Wine Ark, where the bottle’s provenance is known.  

Some of the best Champagnes that are worth your attention include:

• Louis Roederer Cristal Champagne
• Salon Champagne
• Krug Champagne
• Dom Perignon Champagne
• Bollinger Champagne, particularly La Grande Annee, RD and Vieilles Vignes Françaises 
• Taittinger Comtes de Champagne 
• Pol Roger Sir Winston Churchill Champagne
• Veuve Clicquot La Grande Dame Champagne

Discover High Quality Champagne with Wine Ark 

In Australia, many quality smaller houses and grower Champagnes are readily available … if you look in the right places.

If you want to easily and confidently source hard-to-find vintages or discover a new brand, make the Wine Ark Marketplace your first stop. You can filter your search results and quickly find a Champagne to raise a toast with, pair with a meal or directly submit it to your wine storage for ageing.