By Sonja Isger, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer Tuesday, December 31, 2002

PALM BEACH -- A few words on champagne before the masses go to toasting the New Year:

If you're chilling it in the freezer, don't overdo it... it will explode.

That cork is a lethal weapon too, never take the wire cage off (six turns should nicely loosen it) and keep your hand firmly planted on the cork as you turn the bottle.

"They say the pressure in that bottle is like a tire blowing on a bus."

The really cheap stuff ($5.99 for a bottle at 7-Eleven) is more likely to give you a hangover than the fancier stuff.

Virginia Philip ought to know. She's the keeper of The Breakers' cellars as well as a master sommelier and the "Best Sommelier in America" this year, according the sommelier association in New York City.

She's stocking The Breakers with an additional 900 bottles of the fancy stuff (more than 100 varieties, not all from the bubbly's namesake in France) for tonight -- some 600 bottles arriving today.

The fanciest glass will set you back $48 to $50 for Laurent Perrier Grand Siecle or Dom Perignon. For a mere $8.50, a glass of The Breakers' house, Ste. Michell.

The difference goes something like this:

"The $48 one is more yeasty, toasty, has a nut flavor to it... a little bit of lemon. The other is just going to be like a fruit bomb."

The Breakers isn't the only place in town anticipating demand for the drink tonight. Even the 7-Eleven in Lake Worth ordered 30 bottles -- $5.99 for the cheapest.

-- Anonymous, December 31, 2002

Answers

If you can't make it to the hotel, don't despair, Philip says the local wine store (she likes the Palm Beach Publix), can offer a good selection. "Don't feel you have to overspend and don't be afraid to ask."

Champagne has been a little typecast, Philip said. So break the mold -- don't wait for midnight to clink: "You can have it anytime, you can start a meal with it, end with it; you can drink champagne all the way through dinner."

And, she says, try the stuff on the other 364 days.

"I think people need to think everyday in life is a celebration. Champagne is great, why save it?"

[For guzzling, we rather like the cheapo J. Roget. Freixenet ain't bad, but their corks are wilder than most and can put a large dimple in your ceiling. Don't just hold your hand over the cork, have a folded dish towel too! And have a glass ready because that stuff bubbles up and over if you're not careful.]

-- Anonymous, December 31, 2002

Here's why champagne has more fizz

Mysteries pondered by party-goers, such as why bubbles rise more slowly in beer than in sparkling wine, have been solved

NEW Year's revellers probably don't know it, but inside every bottle of sparkling wine is a burbling scientific mystery. Only premium champagnes served in classic crytal flutes were used for the French scientist's study.

And Dr Gerard Liger-Belair is trying to get to the bottom of it - one bottle at a time.

The 32-year-old French physicist - or fizzicist, one might say - is one of a small group of scientists attempting to unlock the secrets of champagne's tiny bubbles.

In just five years, he has begun to overturn some long-held notions about sparkling wine, not to mention solve enigmas such as why beer bubbles ascend more slowly than those in champagne. p> The idea, he says, is not as silly as it may seem.

Makers of sparkling wine sold 262.6 million bottles last year, worth about US$3 billion (S$5.2 billion). For an industry that banks so much on bubbles, finding ways to improve the beverage's hallmark fizz has started to seem like a smart idea. More

[And the acompanying pic shows champagne served in a white wine glass! Philistines! Always serve in a flute! But you knew that, dintcha?]

-- Anonymous, December 31, 2002

I have some old canning jars. If I rinse them out can we use them?

otherwise it's straw in a bottle.

-- Anonymous, December 31, 2002

I have a friend who let a bottle of Andre champagne (I think that's the brand, anyway very cheap) get overlooked so that it aged in the bottle for many years. Lo and behold, when she served it to us, it had turned into a kind of light sherry. I am not making this up. We are not talking Tio Pepe here, but we got it down. Our hostess thought it was a laugh riot.

-- Anonymous, December 31, 2002

We downed a bottle of Freixenet "brut nature" tonight. Good stuff! The label describes it as "bone dry" and it is. The drier it is, the fewer the sulfates, I believe. No headache, anyway. And I do like that nice black matte bottle.

Happy New Year, y'all!

-- Anonymous, January 01, 2003