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#72. The Substandard on Sparkling Wine vs. Champagne
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Micro episode (7:48). All three hosts present.
Dudes Chatting — champagne vs. sparkling wine: Vic opens with a distinction he picked up during a 2009 trip to the Champagne region of France: true champagne must originate from the département de Champagne; everything else, however well made, is merely sparkling wine. Sonny argues the practical counter-position — you've agreed to call it champagne, you ought to honor that contract. JVL is largely indifferent to the distinction. The episode closes on a brief New Year's Eve discussion.
Full transcript
Sonny00:00:00Put it in the, that's, it goes in the garbage.
JVL00:00:03This is it, guys. This is the thing we were always talking about.
Vic00:00:11Hello, and welcome to another micro-episode of The Substandard, sponsored by HelloFresh. I'm Victor Matus, along with Jonathan V. Last and Sonny Bunch. Just a quick reminder that full episodes of The Substandard are available every Thursday at 11 a.m. So, there was a story in the news, I think it was brought to our attention, originally, Sonny, by our colleague at The Beacon, David Rutz. It was the headline, Canadian man has filed lawsuit against Sunwing Airlines for promising a champagne service and instead serving sparkling wine. What are your thoughts?
Sonny00:00:46There are two things we need to discuss here. The first is the importance of living up to your agreements, living up to your contracts. If you tell people you're going to give them champagne. And you give them sparkling white wine, instead, you deserve to be sued. And not only do you deserve to be sued, you deserve to lose. Thank you, Sonny. Because without your word, what are you? You're nothing. Garbage.
Vic00:01:10And I have to say that, for me, it's very personal because, you know, in 2009, I spent a week in champagne and was... Who paid for that? I went to a champagne re-education camp by the CIVC, the Comité International Rééducation. Et pour champagne... Wait, wait, wait. You were brainwashed by the French, is what you're saying. I was. I was. And we learned that champagne is a place, there's something that we call terroir, and that you can't just make sparkling wine and call it champagne. Why can't you do this? Because it's from the champagne... This is the second thing. This is the second thing.
Sonny00:01:45What is the actual difference between sparkling white and champagne?
Vic00:01:48Champagne must come from the département of champagne. And within that boundary, even in France, if you make sparkling wine outside, outside of the champagne region, it has to be like a Cremant or something else. It cannot be called champagne. And it's very distinct because of the soil and the clay and everything else that's in the ground. And the limestone is very important. Limestone is very important, and it gives it a very distinct taste. And the problem is you have other great sparkling wines that could possibly pass off as champagne, but then you go all the way to the other end of the spectrum, and you're talking about corbels and cooks. And so many people I know who will say, oh, I don't like champagne because it gives me a headache. And chances are they've been drinking a $5 bottle. The same goes with lots of other spirits that are very cheap. It'll make you feel very bad the next day, and it drives them crazy. Although I'll tell you, when I was in Champagne, we were having a dinner with the champagne maker Bruno Payard. And it was very friendly. It was a lavish, sumptuous dinner. And suddenly, then he got into this rage. About why the Americans are insisting on calling it, you know, champagne. And it kind of turned into that scene in The Godfather with Waltz, the director. And he's having Tom Hagen over for dinner. Get the hell out of here!
JVL00:03:08It started off lovely. And then all of a sudden he gets up from the table and he starts yelling.
Vic00:03:13And he goes, now you get the hell out of this country! So that was a little bit awkward. But nevertheless, JVL.
Sonny00:03:20Do you have strong thoughts on Sparkling White versus Champagne?
JVL00:03:22You could not possibly have picked a subject on character. You know what I was actually thinking about this. And I thought I was just going to come in and say, Prosecco! Prosecco's the best and all this other stuff is crap. But I could care less.
Sonny00:03:37Have you ever actually had Prosecco versus Sparkling White versus Champagne? Yeah, I've had them all. If we did a taste test, would you be able to pick out the difference between any of these? Would you, Vic? Do you think you'd be able to?
JVL00:03:48More importantly, would I care? No.
Vic00:03:51I would be able to spot a really good Champagne. No, you wouldn't. Liar. You know how you could tell? There's a funkiness. The small bubbles, right?
JVL00:03:57The smaller the bubbles, the finer the bubbles, the more expensive the Champagne.
Vic00:04:01The tears, the bubbles, and also there's a funkiness to it. It almost smells like mushrooms. I had a 1989 Henri Rose. This is the high-end micro-episode, by the way, for our high-end listeners, our hybrid listeners. They'll enjoy this. People on Facebook are just electrified by this, I tell you. The substandard fans who read the Rob Report are really going to enjoy this. But a 1989 Henri Rose. And the best of all the Champagnes. The best of all the Champagnes is Rosé. If you can get a Rosé, it's very expensive.
Sonny00:04:29I thought Rosé was a kind of wine.
Vic00:04:31And Champagne. So, you know, the best of all sparkling wines is Champagne. The best of all Champagnes is Rosé, in my opinion. But there's kind of a musty, a weird musty smell to it. But kind of like it draws you in as well. Kind of a little bit of both. And I was like, ooh, this is funky, like something, like a mushroom. And yet, I want more. Pink Champagne. You like pink Champagne. I don't mind what A.J. Levin called the Pink Plague. I don't mind. The problem is... The problem is, after a week in Champagne...
JVL00:04:58Jonathan, you can do that on Facebook Live.
Vic00:05:02The problem with Champagne, after a week, I didn't wake up at all with a hangover or anything like that. And I drank a lot. I think I might have had two or three bottles of Cristal in one sitting once.
Sonny00:05:12Really? Yes. What proof is Champagne, usually? What is, like, a good Champagne? Oh, I don't know.
Vic00:05:17It's probably like wine. I'm going to say it's like 12%. Yeah, something like that. Yeah, that's right.
Sonny00:05:21That's right.
Vic00:05:22But I never woke up. I woke up sick from the food. You know, I hate eating so much French food. But the sparkling wine, I never had any of those. Tell us about some of these dishes, Vic.
Sonny00:05:31Let's really regale our listeners. How much time do we have? See, here's what you have to understand about journalism is that it's a fake profession. And that most of us just use our access to get free stuff from... From a fake profession. Vic is just a fake journalist. Oh, well, fair enough. Fake news. He's a fake news purveyor. And we spend most of our time trying to figure out how we can go places for free to get things for free.
Vic00:05:52It's very straightforward. And I'll mention. We did this on the main episode on Thursday, which is, you know, you give me...
Sonny00:05:59When we come back to The Weekly Standard and tape it tomorrow morning.
Vic00:06:01You give me free food and drink, and I'll talk about it on air. I don't see what's wrong with that.
Sonny00:06:09Like this, for instance, bottle of Old Forrester Statesman. Oh, the best. It's the best. Bourbon, 95 proof, very drinkable. Yes. Everyone loves it. Yes. How's the mouth feel? Does it have a good mouth feel?
Vic00:06:19When you say that you don't have an opinion on this, what about... I'm setting you up here. What about, like, for New Year's celebrations? What do you drink for New Year's Eve?
JVL00:06:29What do you mean? Sorry, I don't understand the question.
Vic00:06:32You know, at the turning of the clock, as it goes to midnight from December 31 to January 1, which is millions of people, billions of people around the world celebrate this thing called New Year's Eve.
Sonny00:06:44It's a holiday. Yes. People sometimes have a drink to celebrate.
JVL00:06:48When do they do this? They do this at... You mean at midnight, when the New Year begins? Yeah, there's like a countdown.
Vic00:06:53You know, you're familiar with the countdown.
JVL00:06:55The last time I was awake at midnight on New Year's Eve was at least a decade ago. And... Because it has never happened since I had kids. And even before that. But see, I'm not... I'm just... I'm not a late-night guy. I've never been a late-night guy. For me, my whole life, if I'm up... If I was up at 11 o'clock, that was too late for me, because I'm always... I've always been up at, like, 4 or 5 in the morning.
Sonny00:07:21You could set your Apple-slash-Nike watch to remind you, to wake up... I guess I could. ...at, like, 11.55, so you could experience the joy... Yeah. ...that the rest of us feel at watching the odometer roll over, because that's really all we're doing.
JVL00:07:34Can you tell... So... But it's a communal kind of joy, where you celebrate it with other people. Yeah. Your wife, and you say to her,
Vic00:07:40let's look back on the wonderful year we have, and the wonderful year ahead.
JVL00:07:44Yeah, or I just tell her, I'm sure it's fine.
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