What Is Cremant? The French Bubbly That Is Not Champagne

You know Champagne. You probably know Prosecco and Cava. Crémant is the one that keeps getting skipped, and it is the best-value bottle on the sparkling shelf — real French sparkling wine, made the same way Champagne is made, for about a third of the money.

What crémant means

Crémant is French sparkling wine made by the traditional method — the second fermentation happens inside the bottle you buy, exactly as it does in Champagne — but grown somewhere in France that is not the Champagne region. Only that one region gets to use the word Champagne. Everything else made the same way, elsewhere in France, is crémant.

You will see it written both ways, cremant and crémant — same word, the accent just tells you the first e is pronounced "ay". Say it kray-MON.

There are eight of them, named for where they come from: Crémant d'Alsace, de Bourgogne, de Loire, de Limoux, de Bordeaux, de Die, du Jura, de Savoie. The rules are strict — hand-harvested grapes, whole-bunch pressing, a minimum nine months on the lees before disgorging. That last bit is where the bready, biscuity note comes from.

The word itself just means "creamy", and it originally described a gentler fizz. Today it is a place-and-method label, not a pressure reading.

How it differs from Prosecco

This is the part worth understanding, because it is the whole reason the two taste different.

Prosecco's bubbles are made in a tank — big steel pressure vessel, quick second fermentation, then bottled. It is efficient, and it keeps the wine fresh, floral and fruity. Crémant's bubbles are made in the bottle, slowly, sitting on the spent yeast for months. That contact is what gives traditional-method wine its finer, more persistent bead and its toasty, brioche-like undertone.

Put simply: Prosecco tastes of pears and white flowers, crémant tastes of orchard fruit and fresh bread. Neither is the better wine. They are two different drinks that happen to both have bubbles. The full three-way comparison is in Champagne vs Prosecco vs Cava.

The kosher crémant: Giersberger d'Alsace

Alsace is the biggest crémant region in France, and the kosher one on our shelf comes from there — Cave de Ribeauvillé, one of the oldest wine cooperatives in the country, working the granite and limestone slopes around the medieval village of Ribeauvillé.

The Giersberger is a brut, 12 percent, from Pinot Blanc and Auxerrois, made by the traditional method under KLBD supervision. In the glass: green apple, white pear and a gentle brioche lift, a fine and persistent bead, orchard fruit over a chalky mineral core, and a dry, lightly toasty close.

• Cave de Ribeauvillé Giersberger Crémant d'Alsace Brut, 750ml, $24.99 — KLBD, non-mevushal, not Kosher for Passover.

Note the non-mevushal line. If the bottle is being poured at a kiddush or a simcha where that matters, read mevushal vs non-mevushal first.

What to do with a bottle of crémant

Serve it properly cold, about 45°F — an hour in the fridge, or twenty minutes in an ice bucket with water in it, which chills far faster than ice alone. Use a normal white wine glass rather than a narrow flute; the flute looks right and hides the aroma.

It is a better food wine than most people expect. Dry sparkling wine cuts through salt and fat the way almost nothing else does, which makes it very good with fried food, with smoked or poached fish, and with hard cheese. It is a natural Yom Tov fish-course wine and a very good kiddush l'chaim. Our wine with fish guide goes further.

The rest of the sparkling shelf

If you want to taste the difference for yourself, buy a crémant and one of these the same week:

• Elvi Cava Brut, 750ml, $21.99 — Spain's traditional-method sparkler, the closest cousin to crémant.
• Bartenura Prosecco Brut, 750ml, $19.99 — the tank-method side of the comparison.
• Yarden Blanc de Blancs, 750ml, $69.99 — Israel's traditional-method flagship, all Chardonnay.
• Drappier Carte d'Or Brut Champagne, 750ml, $64.99 — the real thing, for the price comparison.

Browse kosher French Champagne and sparkling and Italian sparkling, or read the kosher Prosecco guide and how much a bottle of Champagne costs. We ship anywhere in the country.