What is the best supermarket crap champagne?

marks and spencer do a good own brand one

Taste is a personal thing. Much depends on how much you want to spend. I shall leave aside the vintage marques of the large house (e.g. Dom Perignon, Cristal, Comtes de Champagne, Grande Dame) and very exclusive labels (e.g. Krug, my personal favourite), because they cost north of £50 a bottle.

This will leave you the well-known large house labels, for which you will pay £20-30 a bottle, and the smaller houses / Supermarket "own" labels.

In my opinion, Bollinger is by far the best of the large houses, and certainly not "crap" as you seem to describe it ;) . After this, I would go for GH Mumm or Taittanger.

If you're not bothered about having a recognised label, then in my opinion, the best buy is Etienne Dumont champagne, which is stocked by Sainsburys. It's currently on a 50% off deal, and should cost about £14 a bottle. Sainsbury's "own" brand is pretty good as well, particularly the Blanc de Blancs (made only with Chardonnay grape).

Enjoy :)

waitrose doing 1/3 off

i got a leaflet somewhere

one that got an award is 20 quid i think

once i find leaflet will post you more details

so many opinions! argh! is it jolly bad form to get several different bottles instead of sticking to the 1 brand?

In Rheims the locals - who know their champers very very well- half of em pick for the stuff- have a big gathering every year and buy a selection of supermarket own brand/ local label champs - taste it - and find out which one - that year- is the surplus sold off fropm some of the big champagne houses- on the recommendation of a local i bought 6 bottles on trust at £12 from his corner store - it was re-labelled Verve Cl - back home , we compared it to the £34 'original'- it was the same stuff, true enough
Wish i'd trusted him and got more :(

Agree with Reaper regarding Sainsburys, good value at 14 quid a pop

we've all got this wrong....


he asked for the cheapest CRA P champagne....


astute advice required....

i use a bottle of blossom hill white (2.99) and my old soda stream for the sparkly effect. does the trick perfectly. ;)

ive got carpentier in my football manager team. got him on a free transfer. 19 yr old left/central midfielder from france. hes doing pretty good. cant see his champagne being much good at a tenner though.

i might give it a try if he helps me get wimbledon to win the premier league. not as daft as it sounds lol were top after about 18 games. if he gets sent off and costs us the title i probably wont want his champagne though!

the tescos carpentier stuff at 10 pounds is actually very good ...buy six get 5 % off plus you can buy a case of carlsberg export for 6 pounds as youve spent over 30 quid ...plus double points too ....sounds like i work for tescos ,i dont i hate the place ....

Nova Sicko 13 Dec 15:23


4.99 prosecco pore it in the kitchen, no one knows the difference


regvarney 13 Dec 17:39


does spanish CAVA count as champagne ?
i know it's not french, but it is fizzy wine, and very cheap


No,Cava does not count as champagne. Champagne is composed of 3 grapes (Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier), unless it is a Blanc des Blancs (Chardonnay only) or Blancs des Noirs (Pinot grapes only).

It is twice fermented in the bottle, as opposed to a single fermentation like Cava or Prosecco. The amount of sugar added to trigger the second fermentation determines how sweet the wine is, ranging from Brut Sauvage (very dry), through to Brut, Demi-Sec and Sec (sweetest).

Only wines from the Champagne region are permitted to call themselves champagne, even if the wine is prepared in the same way (look for "Methode Traditionelle á Champagneois" on the bottle for non-Champagne region "champagne")

I find it very easy indeed to distinguish champagne from other wines like Cava, etc.

SNOB