Blanc de Blancs sparkling wines are so-named because they are made only from white grapes - the name translates to 'white from whites'. In this case it's pure Chardonnay, and the wine itself is incredibly pure. Lots of crunchy apple fruit, with some biscuity complexity and a really zesty finish. Great drinking.

Origin: Despite what the French would tell you, the original traditional method sparkling was developed in England in 1662 by scientist Christopher Merret Mainly Grown In: The best thing about traditional method sparkling is that it is essentially the same as Champagne, just from anywhere else in the world! Key Facts: Champagne is both a wine and a region. In fact it is a wine from a region – you can’t make Champagne in Australia. Only in the small region of Champagne, in the north-east of France. But Champagne became like Hoover or Post-It, and became synonymous with fizz from anywhere. The real makers of Champagne got narky about this and made everyone else call it methode traditionelle… but don’t worry, it’s exactly the same technique! FYI - there are other ways to make fizzy wine, but this labour-intensive method produces the most complex results. For fun, frivolous fizz, check out pet nat (aka methode ancestrale). But that’s another story. Fun Fact: “Sabrage” is a term for opening an olden-days method of opening a champagne bottle with a sword (!!), but now with the help of YouTube, you can learn to open a sparkling wine bottle in 100's of wacky ways without ever removing the cork by hand!