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By C. Woo (City Weekend)
Updated: 2007-03-15 10:32

"Do you like your champagne smoky or buttery?" You might hear questions like this circulating at a weekly meeting of the Shanghai Champagne Club, a casual get-together for lovers of the bubbly that meets every Thursday at Maneo. "Before some of our members joined the club," says founding member and general manager of Maneo, Charles Belin, "they didn't have the vocabulary to describe what they were tasting." After a few meetings, however, members acquire a refined palate capable of differentiating floral flavors from a hint of brioche.

You could be forgiven for thinking that all champagne tastes the same. Due to hefty import taxes prior to China's accession to the WTO in 2001, only major brands like Mumms and Moet could be found at most of Shanghai's bars and restaurants. Since January 2006, import taxes have decreased dramatically (import tax on bottled sparkling and still wine is down from around 43 percent to 14 percent) and smaller, lesser-known labels such as Duval-Leroy, Rene Geoffroy and Deutz are breaking into the Chinese market and are accessible to Shanghai-based restaurateurs.

In fact, the club really owes its existence to Deutz. "Charles, some friends and I were at a tasting at Jean Georges when we first tried the Deutz Blanc de Blanc 1998, the 'it' champagne for 2006," says Stephan Montigaud, who was present at the champagne club's moment of conception. "We were like 'Wow!' It was a revelation. We decided we should try to do this [indulge and discover new champagne] every week."

Edouard Duval-Leroy, whose family owns the largest family-owned company in France's Champagne region, is pleased to see both the Chinese market and consumers' tastes develop. Though you won't find his labels at supermarkets, "hotels, restaurants and bars like Maneo have developed a demand for boutique champagnes," he says. "They want to offer their customers something special."

Despite this greater accessibility, "you still mostly see people drinking big-name brands at loud nightclubs where there is little possibility to enjoy or even to taste the subtleties of the flavors," says Belin. For example, most partakers of the celebratory flute probably don't know that some grapes release lactic acid, which gives the final product a buttery, brioche taste; other grapes are aged in a wooden barrel, creating a smoky flavor. Like a fine wine, a fine champagne should be savored using the familiar "uncork, swirl then sniff" tasting method.

For the 20 members who so far frequent the club's weekly meetings, the night is not only about champagne, but also about camaraderie. "There is no grand master plan," says Montigaud. "We just want to create a place for champagne lovers to gather together after work to socialize and sample new labels." Whether you're after education or congregation, the beauty, in fact, lies in the perfect combination of the two. Says Belin, "We've created an unpretentious atmosphere for enjoying a glass of a pretentious drink."

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