Depending on your preference … watch the video or read the words!
I put together this video and blog post after being at an event where more than one winery noted that their sparkling wine had been made by the Charmat method. My first thought was that I was surprised they were making note of that … but this was closely followed by the thought that how many normal people (ie not wine trade!) would know what the Charmat method was.
It’s reasonable to assume that a good proportion of the wine buying public probably doesn’t care – ultimately, if a wine tastes good and is at the right price point, most of us aren’t that interested in the ins and outs of production. But … if you’re one of the ones who is interested … here we go!
This method of sparkling wine production was first patented by an Italian, Federico Martinetti, in 1895 – and it was, unsurprisingly, know as the metodo martinetti. In 1907, after some tweaks and development, it was patented again in 1907 by a Frenchman from Bordeaux, Eugène Charmat – which is where it gets one of its modern names. It’s also referred to as cuve close (in French), the tank method, granvas (Spanish) or autoclave (Italian).
In Champagne (and other premium sparkling wine) production, a still base wine undergoes a secondary fermentation in a bottle. This fermentation (and subsequent ageing) can be anywhere from 15 months up to … well, as long as you want really. Vintage Champagne is required to spend a minimum of THREE YEARS in bottle. Above all, this is time consuming – as a producer you can’t react to consumer demand and get more wine out there quickly! But it’s also expensive (you’ve got bottles sitting around for years not generating cash flow) and labour intensive (in some instances, those bottles will be turned by hand).
The Charmat method solves all of these problems. You take your still base wine (made the same as any wine) but instead of putting it into individual bottles, you put it into a pressurised tank. You then add your yeast and sugar and allow the secondary fermentation to happen. This is a rapid secondary ferment – you’re most certainly not hanging around for years – you’re looking at one to six weeks. The longer the ferment, the finer and more durable the bubbles and the better preserved the wine’s aromatics. Once the winemaker is happy with where things are at, the contents of the tank are chilled to below 0°C and fermentation stops. Keeping the (now bubbly) wine at a low temperature and under pressure, it is then filtered and then bottled (using a counter pressure filler – keeping all those bubbles in).
Straight away – you can see that this is FASTER. It’s also CHEAPER – you don’t need to have hundred or thousands of bottles hanging around the winery and monitoring what’s going on in one large tank is a lot easier than worrying about all those bottles – making it LESS LABOUR INTENSIVE. And guess what? The wines are sometimes (but not always!) cheaper.
Of course, you don’t get to take a few shortcuts without some impact on the finished product. While sparkling wines made using the Champagne/traditional method will often be described as bready, yeasty, toasty, brioche-like you don’t get any of those characteristics with a wine made by the Charmat method. Wines made by the Charmat method are more likely to taste like the base wine plus bubbles. This means the method is really well suited to wines that drink well young and don’t have great ageing capacity.
In general, you won’t find CHARMAT METHOD plastered all over a wine’s label – so it’s not going to be immediately obvious if a wine has been made by this method. If you’re at a cellar door or talking to winery staff, they might be able to tell you and often the tasting/technical notes for a wine will include this information.
If you want to try a Charmat method wine – check out the Golding Last Hurrah. This is an incredibly consistent sparkling from one of our favourite Adelaide Hills producers.
