The best champagne for non-champagne drinkers

Advantages: Good value for money and fresh, appealing taste
Disadvantages: If you can afford to buy better, buy better

...If you are looking for an excellent quality champagne without breaking the bank, than Piper-Heidsieck Brut NV (Non Vintage) is for you. Piper-Heidsieck is one of the "grand marques" of champagne. Its an old established champagne house (founded 1785) based at the home of champagne - Rhiems in France. The NV costs around £16 a bottle UK retail, which is more than supermarket champagne, but you are getting a significant notch up in terms of quality for that extra couple of pounds a bottle. I was trying to choose a champagne for my wedding toasts last year. I bought a variety of champagnes and good quality sparkling wines, ranging in price from around £11 a bottle up to £26 a bottle. I then arranged a blind tasting with freinds. The bottles were all disguised and they were tasted with a view to what would go best at a summer wedding...

KatherineA 09.07.2004 · Read review
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Review of Piper-Heidsieck Champagne (Brut)

Tesco Flavoured Sparkling Water

Advantages: The price!
Disadvantages: Some flavours can be too sweet

...When it comes to flavoured water, I only like the sparkling variety. Is tarted off drinking Marks & Spencers flavoured water, but they were so expensive that they became a treat only. Then I tried Tesco's own range which I found to be excellent quality for the price. My favourite flavour is Apple & blackberry. It has a much more natural taste than some of the other flavours which can be sickeningly sweet. It has to be drank chilled for the best flavour, & is really refreshing, especially on a hot summers day. Best of all, the whole range is very low in calories which means if you're on a diet you CAN have a soft drink which tastes good & doesn't taste as though you're sucking on a saccharin tablet! The range is great value at 42p per bottle, but is usually available on a multibuy, which means you can get 3 bottles for only a quid...

sambam000 07.06.2009 · Read review
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Review of Tesco Fruit Flavoured Sparkling Water

Australian Red Wine (Tesco's)

Advantages: Cheap and cheerful
Disadvantages: Not really what you would serve to impress at a posh dinner party

...I never used to be a red wine drinker, I would have said in the past if someone had offered me a glass "no thanks". But within the past few years I have changed my mind a lot and now do enjoy red wine. THE PRODUCT: Australian Red Wine (south eastern Australia) Selected by Tesco 75 cl 13.0% vol medium and fruity cost: £2.08 Allergy advice: Contains Sulphites Availability: every Tesco supermarket I have been in MY EXPERIENCE: I first bought a bottle of this wine when we were having a barbeque in the summer, I wasn't sure what it was or what it would be like as with most people when buying for a party you tend to just buy a few bottles of a lot of things. I decided however after a few strange glances from my partner that maybe I should try this wine before forcing it on our guests. The first thing I notice was it didn...

fizzybonbon 09.03.2006 · Read review
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Review of Tesco Australian Red Wine (South Eastern Australia)

Austrailian Red wine selected by Tesco worth a try

Advantages: Smooth
Disadvantages: none that I can think of

...Austrailian Red Wine, South Eastern Austrailia selected by Tesco. I am no connoisseur at describing wine, but I could recommend this one. My wife does not even like red wine, but even she found this one pleasant. It is as it says on the bottle "A SMOOTH, MEDIUM-BODIED RED WITH BERRY FRUIT FLAVOURS". Though perhaps being pregnant made my wife normally a non red drinker tollerate this bottle and enjoy it to some extent, and I found it nice enough to ask her to buy it again from Tesco again and I enjoyed it the second time just as much as I did the first time. Describing any kind of flavour is a difficult task for me, but with some kind of wines especially red it is easier to describe what you don't like about them, rather than what you do. The main two failings I find with quite a few red wines is some you could describe as being...

llbcollins 26.10.2008 · Read review
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Review of Tesco Australian Red Wine (South Eastern Australia)

Tesco Australian Red Wine

Advantages: Cheap
Disadvantages: Not something to serve at a party until everyone's drunk!

...Let's face it, you're buying this for £3.00 a bottle. However, MUCH better than some of the chemical crap (e.g. Cape Crossing Cabernet Sauvignon - chemical crap) that some producers pass off as wine in the same price band. It's somewhat acidic with very little body - but who cares at this price? It DOESN'T taste of chemicals and plastic. Better than most cheap table wines, can't go wrong with this - but make sure your guests have had a bit of the good stuff and are a bit pissed before you get the cheap one out. If you want better for your buck do a wine run to France and buy there - but not cheap French wine, it sucks (and they only sell it to stupid Brits like us!)....

Monkey_Spanker 01.10.2008 (30.09.2008) · Read review
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Review of Tesco Australian Red Wine (South Eastern Australia)

Blowing champagne bubbles at a wedding

Advantages: fun
Disadvantages: none

...I was fairly recently at a wedding where there were bottles of bubbles left on tables for guests to pick up. These bottles of bubbles were in a small green bottle (plastic) 9cm tall, containing about ½ oz liquid. The bottle shaped like a champagne bottle with a gold coloured lid. There is a pink label on it saying bubbles and showing a picture of the rainbow wand. Twist open the lid it is attached to a collar with a plastic fixer piece. The lid came off fairly easily. There is a little plastic wand inside the bubbles. Dipping the wand into the liquid the soap bubbble mix attached itself to the wand. Blowing the bubbles was easy they made lots and lots of small bubbles. When we had all assembled to watch the bride and groom throw the bouquet that?s when a lot of people blew the bubbles instead of confetti. These bubbles...

mumsymary 09.11.2009 · Read review
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Review of Champagne Bottle Bubbles

Champagne Truffles

Advantages: Delicious!
Disadvantages: Can only eat in small quantities; the price

...of the highest quality presented in chic, stylish packaging." It all sounds rather highbrow for someone who likes the mass produced confectionary in supermarkets. Does minimalist indulgence mean there's not much indulgence to be had with their products? Still, perhaps despite the above information I still had a box of their champagne truffles to plough through. ~ The packaging ~ These Champagne truffles were intended as a Christmas gift box. Never having seen any other Kshocolat products for sale, I can't compare these to anything else in their range. These were packaged in a small square cardboard box, the bottom half being a dark brown, the top half being a cream colour. I've included a few photos if you're interested, although I apologise for one being somewhat out of focus. There was a label on the bottom of the box containing...

kevin121 25.01.2009 · Read review
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Review of Kshocolat Champagne Truffles

Champagne? Yes, pleas!

Advantages: Inexpensive
Disadvantages: To citrusy in taste

...champagne and goes well with game and cheese. Millesime is produced only when the grapes can ripen under ideal climate condition. Prestige is produced with the best reserve wines as champagne for special occasions. Now, let me tell you the old truism: there isn't any other champagne but French. If you hear people saying: I was drinking Australian champagne, be aware, they mean Australian sparkling wine, which could be very nice indeed, like Yaldara for instance. People call (please don't!!!) champagne any bubbly wine, from New Zealand, Australia, Spain, Italy or even form Russia. The common mistake degrades champagne as prestigious bubbly alcoholic drink and puts it on the same shelf as any sparkling wine from anywhere. Please, remember champagne, real champagne comes from Champagne, France. Amen. The Bottle The bottle is elegant...

malekowie 29.03.2006 (31.03.2006) · Read review
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Review of Bernard Remy Champagne

Sparkle Sparkle

Advantages: Tastes great
Disadvantages: None

...Shloer is a line of non-alcoholic drinks that have always been a favourite of mine for many a year. They are primarily made from grape juice and are of the sparkling variety. Unlike most soft-drinks however they are marketed exclusively towards adults. This doesn't mean however that they are not suitable for children because they are; I have drunk them from being a young child. They are marketed like this simply because they do have an adult appeal hence why their slogan for many years has been "Shloer - the grown up soft drink" Shloer is primarily sold in one litre bottles in most supermarkets and I have just recently seen and purchased it in smaller 275mlbottles, this however was in my local branch of Heron, frozen foods and I have not seen them in the supermarket, but they may well be there. At this point in time I am not aware...

MI9to5 25.09.2008 · Read review
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Review of Shloer Sparkling Juice Drink

Mercier Champagne

Advantages: Exquisite taste, bubbly, moreish
Disadvantages: not too expensive, bottle too small

...I bought this bottle of champagne a couple of months ago from Tesco for a treat. It was priced at £18.99 which isn't too bad for a well known make of champagne. This review is of the Mercier Brut. It comes in a 75cl bottle and its alcohol content is 12% which is enough to get you a bit merry!! Appearance ---------------- The bottle is the normal sparkling wine bottle shape with the cork held on by a metal tie. I like the red and white label which has "Mercier" printed boldly in gold - very classy! The wine itself, when poured, is golden/deepish yellow in colour. It is fizzy, but not to the extreme. Smell -------- I will move onto taste rather than smell as smelling a fizzy wine does not always work as you might find out if you want to try! My mother once had a coughing fit after trying to but thats another story...

neil1424 06.04.2006 · Read review
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Review of Mercier Champagne