• Toast the New Year with top sparklers for $20 or less

    Gloria Ferrer Sonoma Brut hails from California but is made in the traditional Champagne style.

    By Kara Reinhardt, Cheapism.com

    The shouted countdown, the popping corks, the clinking glasses, the strains of “Auld Lang Syne.” In the symphony of a New Year’s celebration, Champagne has long played a crucial part. Many cheaper sparkling wines hit similar notes, however. A California sparkling white, Spanish cava, or Italian prosecco may not come from France’s storied Champagne region, but it can make for an equally festive and much more affordable toast.

    Below are Cheapism’s top sparkling wines for $20 or less.

    • Roederer Estate Brut (starting at $20) comes from a California producer owned by the famed Louis Roederer, maker of Cristal. Reviewers call this bubbly nectar crisp, full-bodied, and surprisingly complex -- an excellent value. (Where to buy)
    • Gloria Ferrer Sonoma Brut (starting at $13) has earned high marks from critics for its flavors, which the winemaker’s tasting notes identify as apple, citrus, and toasted almond. This California sparkler is made according to the méthode Champenoise used in France. (Where to buy)
    • Freixenet Cordon Negro Extra Dry (starting at $9) is a cava from Spain that incorporates different grapes and tastes sweeter than the other two sparkling wines on this list. At the same time, experts say, it’s fresh rather than cloying, with a pleasing finish. The label on the distinctive black bottle reads metodo tradicional, which indicates that the winemaker uses the traditional French method. (Where to buy)

    Champagne and other sparkling wines go through two stages of fermentation. According to French tradition, the second stage, wherein the wines develop their trademark fizz, must take place in the bottle. Other inexpensive sparklers ferment in large tanks -- a cheaper, faster method that actually better suits prosecco. Some of the very cheapest sparkling wines are artificially carbonated, like soft drinks.

    Producers add sugar to nearly all sparkling wines just before the final corking. Most often it amounts to no more than 12 grams per liter, which classifies the wine as brut. Ironically, brut wines are actually drier (or less sweet) than those identified as extra dry. That descriptor applies to wines with 12 to 17 grams of sugar per liter. Those make good selections for revelers who want something a little sweeter than usual. Sparkling wines labeled sec (the French word for dry), demi-sec, or doux are even sweeter and less common.

    The abbreviation NV, which accompanies many sparkling wines, stands for non-vintage. Producers often make still wine using grapes from a single harvest and identify the wine according to that year -- a 2009 Bordeaux, for example. Winemakers produce vintage Champagne only in exceptionally good years and charge a premium for it. Non-vintage sparkling wine has the advantages of being less expensive, more widely available, and consistent from year to year, with the top producers aiming to cultivate a signature taste and style.

    To get the most out of a sparkling wine, the Comité Interprofessionnel du Vin de Champagne, the industry trade organization, recommends chilling the bottle on its side for at least three or four hours before serving.

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  • Celebrate the season with top wines for $10 or less

    Columbia Crest Two Vines Cabernet Sauvignon hails from Washington state and starts at $9.

    By Kara Reinhardt, Cheapism.com

    From awkward office parties to convivial Christmas dinners, wine permeates the holiday season. Guests arrive bearing gift bags specifically sized to hold wine bottles and hosts agonize over which varietals to serve. Some oenophiles might suggest that all cheap bottles resemble the contents of a spittoon, but if holiday shopping has left you with a limited budget, there’s no need to splurge on expensive wine. Cheapism has updated its wine buying guides with top picks under $10, and you won’t find a Franzia or “Two-Buck Chuck” in the bunch.

    First, the reds:

    • Columbia Crest Two Vines Cabernet Sauvignon (starting at $8) comes from Washington and radiates with berry aromas. The 2009 vintage earned a score of 90 from Wine & Spirits magazine, which ranks it as exceptional.
    • Meleni Chianti Borghi d'Elsa (starting at $8) is a Tuscan blend with a bold, fruity flavor. Reviewers have favored vintages including the 2008 and 2010.
    • Dancing Bull Zinfandel (starting at $8) pairs well with a winter meal, according to one connoisseur. It’s a full-bodied California wine that combines flavors of sweet fruit and spice.
    • Mirassou Pinot Noir (starting at $8) is a lighter California red -- a value-priced version of a crowd-pleasing varietal. The 2010 vintage seems to come in for the most praise.

    Moving on to the whites:

    • Dr. Loosen Red Slate Riesling (starting at $10) is a medium-bodied German wine with a pleasing acidity. This is a dry Riesling, not a sweet one. Tasters detect notes of pear and peach.
    • Bodini Chardonnay (starting at $9), which hails from Argentina, is a crisp wine with a depth of flavor that belies its budget price. Wine Advocate and International Wine Cellar both award the 2011 vintage high marks.
    • Chateau Ste. Michelle Columbia Valley Sauvignon Blanc (starting at $8) is a light Washington wine with apple and citrus-fruit flavors and a bit of acidity. The 2011 has won accolades from Wine Spectator.

    A cheap, mass-produced wine may not have the unique character and quality of a meticulously crafted vintage with a high-end pedigree. However, many of the wines above are notable for their consistency -- an important consideration when you’re stocking up for a party, rather than taking a chance on a single bottle.

    If you feel uncomfortable serving inexpensive wine, consider that blind taste tests suggest most people have trouble telling when they’re drinking a cheap bottle. According to one study, wine drinkers without professional training actually rate inexpensive bottles slightly higher on average than pricey ones. Expectation appears to play a key role in our enjoyment of wine: Tasters are primed to admire a wine when told it’s expensive and turn up their noses when it’s labeled cheap. Try serving an affordable red from a decanter or a chilled white with a cloth napkin wrapped around the label. Odds are no one will be the wiser.

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  • Women winemakers achieving acclaim and success

    Eric Risberg / AP

    In this photo taken Thursday, Aug. 9, 2012, winemaker Cathy Corison stands surrounded by oak barrels at Corison Winery in St. Helena, Calif. A lot more women work as winemakers today, though research by Santa Clara University professors Lucia Albino Gilbert and John Gilbert found that just under 10 percent of California wineries have women as the main or lead winemaker.

    By Michelle Locke, The Associated Press

    ST. HELENA, Calif. - In 1978, the first vintage that Cathy Corison made wine, she could count on one hand the number of women she knew of doing the same kind of work in the cellars of the Napa Valley. Without using all her fingers.

    Nearly 35 years later, Corison needs a lot more fingers. Winemaking remains primarily a man's world, but research by Santa Clara University professors Lucia Albino Gilbert and John Gilbert has found that nearly 10 percent of California wineries now have women as the main or lead winemaker.

    Their second finding: Women winemakers tend to be more highly acclaimed than their male counterparts.

    Why? Hard to say— and that's not a question the Gilberts attempt to answer in this study — but it may have something to do with persistence. It takes the same effort and skills for a male or female winemaker to succeed, but women can face additional challenges achieving success in a male-dominated field.

    "I think women winemakers had to be really determined and really passionate and still do," says Corison, named 2011 Winemaker of the Year by the San Francisco Chronicle.

    An academic psychologist who has studied women's career paths, Lucia Gilbert became interested in women winemakers. With little information available on the subject, she put together a comprehensive list of the 3,200-plus winemakers in California, identifying the women and developing the website, Women Winemakers of California.

    The total of women winemakers came to 9.8 percent, below the 15 to 20 percent the Gilberts expected.

    It's easy to see why she overestimated. After all, some of the most famous winemakers ARE women, such as Heidi Barrett, who worked for the "cult" winery Screaming Eagle. Among other kudos, the winery is known as home of a 6-liter bottle of the '92 vintage that sold for $500,000 at the 2000 Napa Valley Wine Auction.

    So, the researchers came up with a new question — are women winemakers achieving disproportionate levels of success?

    Quantifying winery acclaim is a slippery business, but the Gilberts went at it by using the listing of wineries from the 2010 reference work Opus Vino, which includes about 4,000 wineries in the world identified as noteworthy by wine critics and wine writers who worked with the book's editor-in-chief, Jim Gordon.

    The results: 23 percent of California wineries with women winemakers made it into Opus Vino compared to 14 percent of wineries with male winemakers.

    Gordon, former managing editor of Wine Spectator magazine and currently editor of Wines & Vines Magazine, was surprised by the Gilberts' findings. He and the other authors picked out top wines based solely on quality and without regard to the winemakers behind them, so "seeing our selections through the perspective of Dr. Gilbert's data was a kind of revelation."

    But Gordon's not convinced that women winemakers are disproportionately successful compared to men given the 10 percent baseline. "There is still a long way to go there," he points out.

    Are there differences between women and men winemakers?

    Corison used to resist that idea "with everything I had. Because differences have always been against women."

    But after years of working in the field she feels that there may be two differences. "There's pretty good evidence that women have perhaps better sensory abilities. So that's one issue. And, I believe that winemaking is all about details. So perhaps if there's a difference in attention to details? I don't know. I don't feel strongly about that."

    Corison, who grew up in Southern California, took a roundabout path to winemaking.

    She studied biology, but "fell in love with wine when I was a sophomore." She was smitten by "all the usual reasons, it's delicious, you share it with friends, it makes food taste better and vice versa. On another level, I fell in love with the fact that it's a whole series of living systems. I'm a biologist and I'm still studying biology. That's what tunes me into winemaking, the fact that it's alive."

    "There've always been challenges, but I think there have been advantages, too. I think that we sort of stuck out like sore thumbs, so for better or worse people noticed what we did," Corison says of women in her field.

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  • Cheapism: The best wines under $10

    Chateau Ste. Michelle Columbia Valley Cabernet Sauvignon pairs well with meat.

    By Kara Reinhardt, Cheapism.com

    A premium wine, made from hand-picked grapes grown on tried-and-true terrain and watchfully aged to perfection, makes a generous gift for a loved one with a discerning palate. But if you’re looking for a hostess gift or just something to make a holiday get-together a little more festive, a crowd-pleasing wine can be had for $10 or less. Just don’t tell anyone how much it cost — studies have shown that the price of a wine influences tasters’ perceptions of how good it is. In blind tastings, however, people enjoy expensive wines slightly less than cheaper wines.

    Below are Cheapism’s top budget bottles, beginning with the reds.

    • Chateau Ste. Michelle Columbia Valley Cabernet Sauvignon (starting at $10). We haven’t listed a particular vintage of this plummy, full-bodied Washington wine because many are well-reviewed. Most low-cost red wines are best consumed within a couple of years of bottling.
    • Melini Chianti Borghi d'Elsa 2010 (starting at $6). An intensely fruity Italian red that goes as well with pizza as it does with pork.
    • Dancing Bull Zinfandel (starting at $10). A rich, full, berry-flavored wine from a California producer known for its zinfandel.
    • Mirassou Pinot Noir 2010 (starting at $6). Another California red that’s easy to drink -- not overly alcoholic or bitter, like some budget pinot noirs.

    And now for the whites:

    • Dr. Loosen Red Slate (starting at $9). A German Riesling with a refreshing balance of acidity and fruit flavors such as mango, apricot, lime, and pear.
    • Jacob’s Creek Chardonnay (starting at $7). A dry Australian wine that harbors peach and melon flavors. Chardonnay is the best-selling varietal in the U.S. and capable of complexity even at low prices.
    • Chateau Ste. Michelle Columbia Valley Sauvignon Blanc (starting at $9). Another winner from a producer that consistently delivers high-quality budget wines. Pair this light, crisp wine with white meat or seafood.

    Finally, with New Year’s Eve approaching, here’s a look at some of the top champagne under $20. Technically, these are sparkling wines, not Champagne with a capital C, which comes from the eponymous French region and adheres to a specific method of production and standards of quality.

    • Roederer Estate Brut NV (starting at $20) comes from California and has a surprisingly full body, according to reviews, which mention caramel, cherry, and cinnamon notes — just right for the holidays.
    • Gloria Ferrer Sonoma Brut NV (starting at $15) is a lively, fruity California sparkler that has won numerous awards.
    • The sweeter Freixenet Cordon Negro Extra Dry (starting at $10) is made in the traditional French méthode Champenoise but is actually a Spanish cava, a sparkling wine that offers excellent value and has been dubbed a “Champagne killer.”

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