When we talk about sparkling wines, probably the first wine that comes on our mind is champagne. However champagnes are usually very expensive and the fact is that there are cost affordable wines from different regions of the world that have good quality, and they can compete with the champagne.
One of those wines is the Prosecco wine, which name originally came from a village near Trieste in the region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia. The region where the only “real Prosecco” is produced today though, is Veneto. The province of Treviso is famous for its Prosecco vineyards.
Lots of manufacturers, who were producing wines from Prosecco variety in other regions, placed a Prosecco label on the bottles. This lead to trouble. However, recently this situation was changed because a new law was passed. This law strictly states that no one except the manufacturers from the region of Veneto can use Prosecco labels for their wines.
[Not a valid template]Furthermore, rose sparkling wines that used Prosecco mark on them have now lost that opportunity and now we can’t talk about rose Prosecco. These are some of the changes that Italian wine authorities have started to apply several years ago in order to protect one of the wine regions with lots of potential – Veneto.
Prosecco, just like many other sparkling wines from around the world, is produced by using the so-called Metodo Italiano (Charmat process) method. This means that the second fermentation is done in steel tanks under pressure, unlike champagne production that is produced in separate bottles. Because of the specific production process you can notice a difference in the style.
The process of production of Prosecco wine is focused on preserving the characteristics of the variety and fruit aroma on the highest possible level, unlike mineral, oxidative and fermentative aromas that are characteristic for Champagne.
However it is not unusual to find different manufacturers that experiment with the methods of production. For example, in Valdobladene zone it is allowed to use the so-called champenoise method, so don’t be surprised if you find this kind of variation of Prosecco wine.
[Not a valid template]Prosecco wine can be mild (Italian: Frizante) or normally sparkling (Italian: Spumante). The main difference between these two types of Prosecco is the pressure of the bottles. A bottle of spumante has a pressure of 3,5 bar while a bottle of frizante has a pressure of 2,5 bar.
Furthermore, the styles vary according to the percentage of sugar in one bottle of the wine, ranging from Brut, which is dry and has less than 15 grams of sugar in one liter, through extra dry and dry that is considered to be very sweet because it has between 15 and 35 grams of sugar per liter. Most Prosecco wines have specific fruit aroma mostly from citrus, peaches, apricots and apples.
If you are looking for a quality cost affordable sparkling wine – Prosecco will certainly meet your expectations.