Making Champagne

The yeast you'll probably need is S.cerevisiae Strain EC1118. Two brands that I know of are:

Gervin Varietal C (Gold label) Lalvin EC-1118

This strain of yeast is (apparently) used for about 85% of all champgne production. Is very easy to use (reletively speaking) and capable of over

I use the Lalvin, it's a good secondary yeast for Champagne. I usually start with either Lalvin D47 or 71B, depending on the grape.

Try here for info on sparkling wine, actually all winemaking.

Joe

thinking

Lum's site sets out the basic nicely. Here's some more indebt information:

When you get to the bottling stage, I have some pretty good notes on the latest additives taken from a lecture by David Munksgard, or you can purchase a copy of the lecture given at the Midwest Grape and Wine Conference in 2004 from SMS. I don't know that's it on their website, but if you contact them I'm sure they can forward a copy of the proceedings.

clyde

First buy a vineyard in the Champagne region of France.... :-) or just accept that you can make a good sparkling wine, but not really Champagne.

years.

Timing sounds about right. It really takes a couple of years at a minimum.

Lum does a pretty good job at

I found experience with bottle conditioning beers very helpful when making sparkling wine. Just be aware, we are usually talking higher levels of carbonation for sparkling wines than we use for beer.

I've done a couple of batches so not an expert but do have some experience. After reading up a little, if you have any questions, fire away.

Andy