This Drawing Explains How Champagne, Prosecco and Cava Differ.
Not all sparkling wines are created equal. While you may know this, the specific differences between the ever-popular champagne, trendy prosecco, and the always-delicious cava are a little more subtle. This drawing from VinePair breaks them down easily, including how they are made, where they are made, and how to pick one.
Perhaps most obviously, the champagne is clearly French, because only sparkling wines produced in the Champagne region can bear the name. Cava and prosecco, on the other hand, are produced in Spain and Italy respectively, and have different standards for how they get their names. All three wines have varying degrees of sweetness, and terms such as brut, extra brut, and half seconds describe this sweetness (extra brut and brut describe dry wines, while sec and demi-sec “. -sec” describe sweeter wines) and are considered by some to have nothing to do with quality. Each type of sparkling wine is also made from different grape varieties and produced in specific regions, which is important to know before you go shopping.
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