Press for Champagne: A Guide to Enjoying the World’s Greatest Sparkling Wine

Champagne, Prosecco, Cava…mmm. I love bubbles. A few weeks ago, I received a call from a dear friend of mine, Beth Werner. She is a book editor and marketer, and she was excited to share with me a new book about Champagne. Beth and I have shared a glass or two of the sparkling nectar and she felt it was a perfect fit for Luxe Beat. The book is called Press for Champagne: A Guide to Enjoying the World’s Greatest Sparkling Wine by Christopher Ruhland. It is a treasure! There is a interesting story behind the title “Press for Champagne” and I will let you read the book to discover the origin. If you are passionate about wine or Champagne, it is worth the read. Chris was kind enough to do an interview with us, as well as provide an excerpt from his book. Read on to learn more about his passion for sparkling wine and how this book developed.

Who is Christopher Ruhland?

Christopher Ruhland has practiced law for almost 30 years and is now a mediator. He has a deep passion (his wife would call it an obsession) for wine. He holds a Diploma in Wines & Spirits from the Wine & Spirit Education Trust. Chris has also earned the French Wine Scholar and two master-level certifications from the Wine Scholar Guild. He lives in Austin, Texas and drinks a lot of Champagne.

A bit about this book…

Champagne is the most magical of wines and the most misunderstood. A glass of Champagne delivers joy, amusement, conviviality, and jubilation, making drinking Champagne one of life’s great pleasures. Champagne is not so much meant for celebrations as it is a gift that generates celebration on demand.

Yet few wine drinkers truly know Champagne well enough to seize the joy they could be drawing from it. Champagne marketing and labels often confuse more than they inform. And understanding the different styles, types, and producers of Champagne – and how they align with your own personal preferences – can seem like a daunting task.

Press for Champagne leads readers through a personal discovery of Champagne that removes the barriers to maximizing the joy Champagne has to offer. Entertaining, informative, organized, and clear, Press for Champagne takes readers on a journey through the broad array of Champagnes available to today’s drinkers. It shows, through examples, how and why Champagnes differ and how to understand them, giving readers the tools to develop their own preferences and explore further. This is a drinker’s guide to Champagne. Press for Champagne accompanies you on an adventure that will enhance your appreciation of Champagne and the pleasure you receive from it.

The interview…

How did your book come to life?

I’ve had many friends ask me about Champagne over the years, and I dispense advice as best I can. But at some point, I realized that it would be a lot easier if wine drinkers had a written guide to understanding and enjoying Champagne. I thought, “Why not put all of my thoughts, advice, and other things I have to say about Champagne into a book?” So the book really was born out of a desire to help wine drinkers like my friends.

What other books are like yours?

I own over 100 wine books and have read others, and I can’t think one wine book that is like mine. I set out to write a different kind of wine book. Most wine books all but ignore the wine drinker holding the book, and that’s actually fairly sensible if you want to provide an objective account of a type of wine, a wine region, or wine producers. But you can read a great wine book and end up learning very little about how you might connect with the wine on a personal level. My book does explain what Champagne is all about, but the book is really about you and what you can experience when you explore the different styles and types of Champagne. It’s a book that opens doors for you to walk through and enjoy Champagne much more than you do today.

Why do you think your readers are going to enjoy your book?

Readers have told me they love that the book is fun, accessible, and informative. It’s written in a down-to-earth style that doesn’t come off as wine-geeky. Champagne should be fun, and even when I’m talking about something that might at first seem esoteric, I have a conversation with the reader in same way that I would talk to a friend. In fact, people who know me and who have read the book and found it useful have commented that I wrote the book in the same way that I talk.

What is unique about your book?

I don’t know of another wine book that makes points by discussing, among other things, the Grand Canyon, Troy Ave’s album “New York City,” and Henry Frankfurt’s book, “On Bullshit.”

3 adjectives to describe the book.

Fun. Revealing. Smart.

Who inspires you?

My two sons. They are best human beings I know, and I am encouraged every day just by thinking about them.

Where do you find your ideas?

I get a lot of my ideas from books that have nothing to do with wine. I read a lot of non-fiction in subjects such as philosophy, history, science, and the arts. It’s not unusual for me to read something in a book on Buddhism, or neuroscience, or contemporary politics and have it trigger an idea that relates to wine. When that happens, I jot down notes on my phone, which I later transfer to a Word document.

What type of research did you do for this book?

I’ve read almost every book published about Champagne, going back to the first significant book on Champagne written in English in 1882. And there is a lot of excellent information online collected by wine-obsessed people like me. I’ve visited Champagne several times and spoken with many winemakers there. But much of the research involved drinking Champagne, and this is by far my favorite research method.

How long have you been writing?

I’ve been writing my entire adult life, though mostly as a lawyer. I wrote a book called the “Attorney-Client Privilege Answer Book.” I don’t recommend the book to anyone who is not a lawyer!

What is your writing process?

When writing a chapter or a section of a book, I first collect my thoughts in notes in a Word document. In that stage, I don’t care how messy or crazy the notes appear to be. In other words, I don’t edit myself. Then I print the notes and see if I can find patterns, if I can organize the notes in some way. I’ll then edit the notes to re-organize or restate them. This could happen a few times. Eventually, I have notes that fit together in some way, and I will use those notes as the basis for whatever I am writing.

What are your strengths and/or weaknesses as a writer?

I’m a slow writer. I labor over sentences and paragraphs and chapters. And I’m easily distracted, so I need to write alone, in silence, without interruptions. When you add these weaknesses together, you get an experience that can be very frustrating.

But a strength is that I am a careful observer and an interested learner. So over the years, whenever I’ve read a piece of good writing, I’ve taken mental note and then found ways to use what I learned to improve my own writing. I think you have to be interested in something to improve, and I’m fascinated with writing.

How would you define your writing style?

My style is direct and simple, while still being evocative. I want readers to easily understand what I am saying, as if we were having a casual conversation.

Where did you grow up and how did it influence your writing?

I grew up in Valencia, California. It was a small town, and people spoke in simple terms. It didn’t feel like anyone was trying too hard to impress. I still sense that influence.

Do you like to travel?

I do love to travel and can’t wait to resume roaming around once we get past the pandemic. My favorite city is Florence. It’s romantic in a way that is understated and genuine.

Do you have a favorite restaurant you would recommend if we visit Austin?

There is no better spicy chicken sandwich on the planet than the one at June’s in Austin, Texas.

When you go into a bookstore, where do you go first? I pick the first non-fiction section I can find and see what it’s about.

What are you currently reading?

I’m supposed to go to Sicily in April, so I’m reading Palmento, by Robert Camuto.

What is the best book you’ve read?

An impossible question to answer. I wouldn’t know where to begin!

5 Random Facts about Chris…

• I’m 6’5″, so shower height is really important to me.
• I bought a lot of t-shirts during the pandemic, and now I complain whenever I have to wear anything remotely formal.
• I am an obsessive walker. If I don’t get a 6-mile walk in during the day, I’m super cranky.
• I can’t whistle. I’ve tried.
• I’ve visited all 50 states. It was another obsession at some point.

What books or authors have most influenced your life?

Again, I would have such a hard time answering this fully because I have been influenced by so many. I will say that if I had to draw up a list, the authors would be all over the place. To give you a few: Alan Watts, Christopher Hitchens, Hunter S. Thompson, and Tom Wolfe.

When you’re not writing, how do you spend your time?

Spending as much time as possible chilling out with my family. When someone asks me what I’m going to be doing next weekend, if I can honestly say “as little as possible,” I’m happy.

If you could ask the genie in the bottle to grant you one wish, what would it be?

Make everyone be a little kinder. Seriously, that’s all we really need.

Have you ever sat and just watched the people go by?

I used to fly a lot for work. I always got to the airport early, and I watched people go by all the time. It’s a fascinating window into humanity.

To reach Chris, you can find him on Twitter @c_s_ruhland. He’s shared his book introduction with us below. Thank you, Chris, for sharing your love of Champagne! Cheers!

Sneak peek…book introduction from Press for Champagne: A Guide to Enjoying the World’s Greatest Sparkling Wine:

What if delivering bliss to someone were as simple as connecting a button to a wire? I imagine that’s the question the proprietor of Bob Bob Ricard, an eclectic yet elegant London diner, must have asked when configuring the restaurant. Because, while the restaurant features many unusual and amusing design elements and menu items, nobody on the other side of the world ever would have heard of the place if it weren’t for a single stroke of genius. Bob Bob Ricard installed buttons at each booth marked “Press for Champagne.” Press the button from your booth, and a waiter appears to hand you a glass of Champagne. Just think for a moment about sliding into one of those booths and noticing the button. How tempted are you to press it? Do you smile just thinking about it? Yeah. I do too. 

This is the magic of Champagne. You only have to speak of it to make somebody happy. Plenty of wines are wonderful and delicious, but no wine delivers more immediate joy, laughter, surprise, and convivial- ity among wine drinkers than Champagne. There is a sense in which Champagne seems like it belongs not in the category of wine but in a special bucket of life’s pleasures that predictably cause us to rejoice. And it delivers on its promise virtually every time. This is why we love Champagne. 

Like anything magical, though, Champagne is mysteriously enchanting in a way that feels supernatural, inexplicable. What’s going on in the glass of Champagne in your hand that makes it taste different from another Champagne? Why do you like one Champagne more than another, and, perhaps more importantly, how can you identify other Champagnes that are similar to the ones you enjoy the most? Are there other types and styles of Champagne that you haven’t tried but would love if you did? And how would you even go about finding the answers to these questions? These are the questions asked by the curious Champagne drinker, the person who enjoys Champagne but who correctly intuits that there is so much more joy to be unlocked. 

As someone who has spent years obsessively studying and drinking Champagne, I can assure you that Champagne is even better—way better—than you think it is. Not only that, but the personal journey of exploring Champagne, of discovering your own preferences and creating your own model of Champagne, is itself thrilling and satisfying. That’s the great news. The problem is that there is no guide for your expedition. You could explore Champagne the way I did: by poring over numerous dense reference books, taking long instructional courses, stumbling through Champagnes you don’t understand for reasons you don’t understand, compiling hundreds of tasting notes and trying to find threads and distinctions here and there. At the same time, if you take that path, you’ll need to do even more research to figure out what parts of Champagne marketing and promotion are true and helpful and what other parts are false, misleading, and misguided. Sounds fun, right? 

Hell no. I wrote this book because there is another way, an easier way, and I want to share it with you. You can know and enjoy Champagne as much as I do. To accomplish this, you don’t need to be a wine expert, or memorize every bit of minutiae about Champagne, or have a specially trained palate, or consume hundreds of bottles of wine. Nor do you need a hyper-specific instructional manual, as if you were assembling an Ikea bedroom set. 

What you need is a guide. A guide does not tell you exactly what to think, what to like, or what to do. A guide points out the noteworthy and, by doing so, helps you find your own path. That is what this book is. I’m going to show you how to organize your journey through Champagne, what to look for, and how to understand what you encounter. You just need to bring your curiosity, your willingness to explore mindfully, and your love of Champagne. If you do that, at the end of it, you will have opened the doors to the amazements in Champagne and will have become a better, more satisfied, more joyful Champagne drinker. And who in their right mind wouldn’t want that? 

We’re going on an adventure through Champagne. And we’re doing it with purpose. So, grab a glass and an ice bucket, and get ready to drink and enjoy. 

 

Feature Photo by Billy Huynh on Unsplash