Champagne: How to choose new favorites

No type of wine brings out our fear of change like Champagne.

It's not just the bubbles: We might grab an unknown bottle of Prosecco or Cava - both efforts with such wild swings in quality that loyalty should be rewarded - but when it comes to the true stuff from France, paralysis strikes.

Those with an eye for Veuve Clicquot's yellow label can spot it at 50 paces, and shell out no matter the cost - despite it being the Justin Bieber of bubbles. The personal freight of a Champagne is so heavy that a few years back Decanter magazine dived into the psychographic waters with a piece on what our favorite Champagnes say about us. (Because, Krug drinkers, it really is all about you.)

I'm guilty of this. Once upon a time I was a Piper man. Then I was a Deutz man. Then I had my exploratory phase with grower Champagnes - a phase you never really grow out of.

Only now, as an omnivorous lover of Champagne, do I have the courage to accept that the RM (a grower who makes his own wine) over NM (negociant) superiority is a bit 1998. Tell the folks at tiny Diebolt-Vallois that they're a bunch of faceless corporate stooges. (You might realize I just dropped one of the best bubbly buying hints of the year. But alas, I've said too much.)

The path to Champagne open-mindedness is a long one, so here are five suggestions to start breaking you out of your rut. The pleasure is that even if a Champagne isn't quite your thing ... it's still Champagne.

Check the origins. By no means will this guarantee great Champagne, but you can find cells of greatness in many grand cru villages (Champagne is ranked by the price of grapes each village can potentially command). Towns like Ambonnay, Ay and Bouzy (for Pinot Noir) or Cramant, Le-Mesnil-sur-Oger and Avize (for Chardonnay) have a preponderance of great vineyard sites, harnessed by local producers. So check the address.

But don't swear by them. Champagne's cru classification makes Bordeaux look easy to understand. Because the rankings are by entire villages, there's no assurance that grand cru Champagne will exceed premier cru. Case in point: the wines of Vilmart, from the premier cru village of Rilly-la-Montagne, which have become some of the region's most sought-after wines. It's why trusted names are still the best guide in Champagne.

Small big labels. While most of the intellectual interest in Champagne lies in the growers, they still account for about 4 percent of the U.S. market. But there are larger negociant houses that still work on a relatively small scale. Philipponnat is a perfect example; it makes more than 500,000 bottles per year in the village of Mareuil-sur-Ay (merely a premier cru village) but its Clos des Goisses is one of the most timeless Champagnes made, and its Royale Reserve (see sfgate.com/ZKSC) is one powerful bottle as well.

Check your favorite wine lists. Gone are the days when lists had to fall back on the same familiar names. Wine directors love to find new Champagnes to set them apart, and not only will you win some points by researching the less-familiar names on your favorite lists (and probably get a better deal than the high markups on popular labels), you'll also have a great potential buying guide. New discoveries are always appearing. Barnaut, a top name from Bouzy, is sold by the glass at Slanted Door. Oakland's Camino serves the splendid Agrapart, from Avize.

Unheralded corners. Even if the above village names are familiar, some of the biggest momentum in Champagne lies in less-known spots. To the far south of the Champagne region, the Aube department - long in the shadow of Reims and Epernay - now hosts such groundbreaking producers as Drappier, Cedric Bouchard and Vouette et Sorbee (see "A handful," right). To the north of Reims in tiny Merfy is Chartogne-Taillet, whose grower bubbles are a perennial fave.

Jon Bonné is The Chronicle's wine editor. Find him at jbonne@sfchronicle.com or twitter.com/jbonne.

This article appeared on page K - 8 of the San Francisco Chronicle