This post was originally published on May 31, 2015 on the now-defunct Wayward Wine Pixie blog.

I’ve got a friend who is studying for his WSET Diploma exam and he’s enlisted my help a few times to taste through and talk about wines he might get on his exams. Currently mired in the Fortified and Sparkling sections of the six-part process, he asked me to join him last weekend to tackle no less than fifteen bottles of bubbly.

I have no idea if I am really of any help to him, but however can I pass up such an offer?

We tasted them non-blind in flights of three that simulated something that might actually happen on testing day. First up was my favourite flight: wines made using traditional Champagne grapes Chardonnay and Pinot Noir/Meunier, and for the most part made in the traditional method as well. Well, OK, I really just liked this flight the best because it had REAL Champagne in it. A producer I had never heard of, but it stood out heads and tails above the other two for complexity and balance. Sorry, fruity friends from Cali and Oz.

Up next was a flight of three Spanish Cavas. While the similarity ran through the flight (the scent of Cava always makes me think of the smell of the Barbie doll heads of my youth – or Ian Cauble’s freshly cut garden hose in SOMM), there were some subtleties to be detected, and the Gran Reserva was the clear-choice winner in my books.

Then the inevitable Italian flight came along. I guess it had to happen sooner or later: we tasted some Glera, known to the masses as Prosecco. He had two bottles and was wondering if we should open them... I generally detest Prosecco so was fine either way, but when I pointed out to him one was a DOC and the other a DOCG, he opted to open them both. Sigh... OK.

The DOC was atrocious. Blechhh. The DOCG was marginally better; I could probably choke down a glass in polite company. There are no photos of these wines (protecting the innocent or something like that). I hear there’s a worldwide Prosecco shortage. Gee, that’s too bad. We did not taste a Franciacorta (a shame, for they are delicious!) but as we shared one over New Year’s Eve and dissected it then, I know he will confidently pick it out if poured one in class.

The surprise wines were the Moscato d’Asti (it tasted like drinking dessert, actually not unpleasant at all) and the Lambrusco. While there is much Lambrusco lambasting that happens, a few micro-regions produce some pretty decent stuff, and my cohort stumbled upon a winner. Yep, I could for sure drink a glass or two of this with tomato pasta. And I kind of have a soft spot for the super-cheesy “rose petals falling from heaven” wine label.

We also tasted a very famous German sparkling Sekt that is produced in enormous quantities and often sold, as in this case, in half bottles — and, I believe in larger formats. It was abhorrent. This is the kind of bubbles you buy because you want to spray it all over hockey players after a winning game. Do NOT put it in your mouth. Again, no photo.

Then came out another tasty treat, probably my second-favourite wine of the afternoon. A brut vintage Vouvray with zippy acidity and giving one pause for thought, I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Heck, I enjoyed the whole experience, icky wines and all. Getting together with a fellow wine geek to taste the world of bubbles and hash out their differences in the hopes of helping him pass his exam was an absolute delight.

Yep, all in a day’s work.