Anonymous wrote:Veuve Clicquot runs about $40. I like it better than Tattinger.

You can't go wrong with the Widow.

Use to get this all the time, but it has got pricey. Once you drink it, you will have problems going back the to the large producers. It just blows away the big names. About 12 years ago you could get it for $35-40 a bottle.

Agree with previous two PPs. Do not get Korbel. Pretty much any cava or prosecco would be better and often cheaper. Total Wine lists Korbel for $10. Chandon Brut is $15 and Piper Sonoma $14.

For prosecco: I like La Marca ($13), Cupcake ($9.50), Riondo ($11-highly rated).

For Cava: Rondel Brut is highly rated and only $9.

Veuve Clicquot runs about $40. I like it better than Tattinger.

A nice rose is great for summer, and our friends just introduced us to some amazing sparkling sauvigon blancs out of NZ that are really interesting and a bit unusual. I'd just go to a good wine shop (like Calvert Woodley) and get some good advice from an old hand there.

Gruet is good. I like Pierre Jouet as well. Moet is my $20 bottle of choice. I would not give Korbel as a gift.

Agree its tacky to get a cheap champagne. Stick with Prosecco. And NO Tattinger and Korbel are not acceptable.

I will admit, I like the Sophia sparkling wine though!

Anonymous wrote:Korbel is awful and also tacky. Agree with the pp's suggestions. Prosecco is great if you can't afford better champagne but a really nice rose would also make a good gift since it's summer.

+1

You can't really get cheap champagne. Prosecco is great. As a champagne drinker, please, please, please don't get Korbel. I won't drink it. Well, unless I was really really drunk

Korbel is awful and also tacky. Agree with the pp's suggestions. Prosecco is great if you can't afford better champagne but a really nice rose would also make a good gift since it's summer.

Sparkling wine is my drink of choice. Korbel is awful. So is Sofia. But the wines suggested above are way more expensive. What's your price range? Under $20 at Safeway (on sale, closer to $15), you could get Gruet (made in New Mexico, believe it or not), Chandon (the US affiliate of Moet & Chandon), Piper Heidsieck, Gloria Ferrer, or Graham Beck (S African). Get a brut, unless you know your audience well.
If you want to spend a little more, the suggestions above are good, and you probably won't go wrong with any true champagne (from the Champagne region of France, unlike the wines I suggested above). I've read advice that says a cheap (which will probable be at least $30) champagne is better than a comparably priced sparkling. I don't know if that's always true, but it is true I haven't had bad champagne, but I have had bad sparkling wine.
If you want to spend less, I'd go with a cava (Spanish sparkling) or a prosecco (Italian sparkling), but ASK someone at your wine store. Some cavas and proseccos are ridiculously sweet, and some are incredible deals--dry, bubbly, delicious, and cheap (in other words, perfect!).

Chandon Brut for $35.

What is your budget? You can get Taittinger Brut for about $40. I prefer that.

As a champagne drinker, I would not give champagne. If you give a good bottle, most people would not know its good, even the wine crazies and a lot of people will not drink it.

Try a few of these makers if you want to give or drink champagne:

Pierre Moncuit: all-chardonnay (blanc de blancs), good price.
 
Pierre Péters: Chardonnay reliably toothsome, mineral-rich.
 
Anselme Selosse: ultra-distinctive, unfailingly delicious, cult like following.

the RM on the bottle means the champagne comes from a grower who raise they own grapes vs NM who buy their grapes from growers.

I would bring Sophia... it's not that more expensive, the bottle is pretty and most people have not had it... so, something new.

Is Korbell Brut a good champagne? Would that be nice enough to give to the host of a dinner party?