Mais Non! French Ditch the Champagne Cork

Tilt the glass, as if you were pouring a beer

(NEWSER) - For the best-tasting bubbly, pour your champagne into a tilted glass. So says a team of French scientists, who claim that the traditional straight pour allows too many gas bubbles to escape. It's those bubbles that give champagne its taste and aroma, explains the AP . Also, a cold bottle helps. Disbelievers can read the study for themselves here in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry. More»

Quality rivals mean champagne prices shouldn't take the bubbles out of festive drinking

(NEWSER) - Champagne may feel like a vestige of a world without a credit crisis, but there's no need to go without bubbly on New Year's Eve. Slate offers some moderately priced options:

• Cava is Spain's answer to champagne, made by the same method. A thrifty seeker of festive spirits can pick up a bottle of Cristilano Cava Brut and get change from $10.

Wine growers battling cheap imports launch commando attacks

(NEWSER) - Tough times have turned some wine-growers in southwestern France to "wine terrorism," Time reports. Guerrilla grape-growers have bombed supermarkets and government buildings, hijacked trucks carrying foreign wine, and drained tanks. The growers want the French government to protect them from the cheap imports they say are threatening their survival. More»

Italian bubbly makers hope to edge out pricey champagne

(NEWSER) - Sales of Italy's answer to champagne have been bubbling up for years, Reuters writes, but prosecco producers plan to boost output to 250 million bottles next year, with an eye on someday overtaking champagne as the world's favorite sparkling wine. The bubbly is cheaper to make than its French rival, and vintners believe its sweeter taste will go down well in red-hot export markets like China. More»

Old rules to go as France tries to catch up with New World wines

(NEWSER) - France is ditching some long-cherished wine rules to compete with upstart New World wines, the London Times reports. The country, which sees itself as the center of the wine world, has been steadily losing market share to wines from places like Australia and California. A new class of French wine will permit "foreign" techniques such as adding tannins or wood chips. More»