50 free Champagne trivia questions with answers — food & drink quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
41 free Champagne trivia questions with answers. Champagne trivia to pour alongside the real thing. These 50 questions cover the wine itself (the three grapes, why bubbles form, the six bars of pressure behind the cork, riddling and disgorgement, what Brut means and why the British are to blame for it), the region (Reims, Épernay, the chalk cellars UNESCO listed in 2015, and the 1911 riots when growers dumped fake grapes in the Marne) and the houses: Ruinart, Moët, Veuve Clicquot, Krug, Bollinger, Pol Roger, Louis Roederer, Taittinger and the rest. Along the way you will meet the monk who did not invent sparkling wine, the widow who did invent the riddling table, the tsar who wanted a clear bottle so he could see poison, the Le Mans winner who started spraying it on podiums, and the biblical kings the giant bottles are named after. Every answer is checked against a documented source, so it is safe for a New Year's Eve party, a wine club or anyone who wants to sound clever with a flute in hand.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which three grapes are used to make almost all champagne?
Pinot noir, Pinot meunier and Chardonnay
Tiny amounts of Pinot blanc, Pinot gris, Arbane and Petit Meslier are also permitted.
Q 02Roughly what pressure builds up inside a bottle of champagne?
Six bar, about 90 psi
That pressure is what shoots out the frozen plug of yeast sediment during disgorgement.
Q 03The name 'Champagne' has been legally protected under an international treaty signed in which year?
1891
Under EU law and the Madrid system the term is reserved for sparkling wine from the region; even 'méthode champenoise' was banned by an EU court in 1994.
Q 04What is the oldest recorded sparkling wine, predating Dom Pérignon?
Blanquette de Limoux
Benedictine monks near Carcassonne made it in 1531 by bottling wine before its first fermentation had finished.
Q 05Which English scientist's 1662 paper explained that adding sugar before bottling makes wine sparkle?
Christopher Merret
The English liked the bubbles that French producers still considered a fault, and had the strong glass to contain them.
Q 06Dom Pérignon was a monk of which religious order?
Benedictine
He was cellar master at the Abbey of Hautvillers; sparkling wine did not become the region's dominant style until the mid-19th century.
Q 07The first vintage of Dom Pérignon, the prestige cuvée, was 1921. In which year was it first sold?
1936
It sailed to New York on the SS Normandie; the brand had been given to Moët by Champagne Mercier in 1927 as a wedding present between the families.
Q 08Which is the oldest established champagne house, making champagne exclusively since 1729?
Ruinart
Nicolas Ruinart started giving 'wine with bubbles' to his cloth customers and gave up cloth six years later.
Q 09Moët & Chandon was founded in 1743 by whom?
Claude Moët
The Chandon name was added in 1833 when a son-in-law joined; the house now makes about 28 million bottles a year.
Q 10Madame Clicquot is credited with inventing the riddling table, to clarify champagne, in which year?
1816
She also made the first known vintage champagne in 1810 and the first blended rosé in 1818.
Q 11Veuve Clicquot's label has been which distinctive colour since the late 19th century?
Yellow
The house was founded in 1772 in Reims; the 'comet vintages' of 1811 made its name in Russia.
Q 12What is the French name for riddling, turning bottles so the sediment collects in the neck?
Remuage
After riddling, the neck is frozen and the cap removed so the pressure ejects the plug of lees.
Q 13Under the appellation rules, champagne must spend at least how long developing in the bottle?
Fifteen months
Vintage champagne, made entirely from one year's grapes, is aged much longer; most champagne is a non-vintage blend.
Q 21Perrier-Jouët's flower-painted Belle Epoque bottle was designed by which Art Nouveau artist?
Emile Gallé
Octave Gallice met the glassmaker in Paris; the house itself dates to 1811.
Q 22The Champagne riots of 1911 saw growers dump grapes and wine from which region into the Marne?
The Loire
Merchants had been passing off outside grapes as Champagne after years of ruined harvests and phylloxera.
Q 23Dan Gurney started the podium champagne spray tradition after winning which race in 1967?
The 24 Hours of Le Mans
He and A. J. Foyt had beaten the Ferraris in a Ford GT40; a week later he won the Belgian Grand Prix in his own Eagle.
Q 14The dry style labelled 'Brut' was created for the British market by which house in 1876?
Pommery
Perrier-Jouët had started the trend by not sweetening its 1846 vintage for London; 19th-century champagne was far sweeter.
Q 15The wire cage that keeps a champagne cork in, the muselet, was invented in 1844 by whom?
Adolphe Jaquesson
Early sparkling wine was called 'the devil's wine' because bottles exploded and corks blew out.
Q 16Which champagne house has used the James Bond films as marketing since Live and Let Die in 1973?
Bollinger
A Special Cuvée 007 edition marked No Time to Die; the house was founded in Aÿ in 1829.
Q 17Cristal, considered the first prestige cuvée, was created in 1876 for which ruler?
Tsar Alexander II of Russia
He wanted a clear bottle so he could see the wine, and had reason to fear poison: he had been the target of assassination attempts.
Q 18Which champagne house makes a prestige cuvée named for Sir Winston Churchill, its most famous devotee?
Pol Roger
Pol Roger himself started the house in 1849 in Champagne and released his first wines in 1853.
Q 19Which house makes the all-Chardonnay Comtes de Champagne and planted vines in Kent in 2017?
Taittinger
Its English sparkling wine, Domaine Evremond, was first released in April 2025.
Q 20Which actress was rumoured to keep a month's supply of Piper-Heidsieck in her kitchen?
Marilyn Monroe
The house was founded in Reims in 1785 by Florens-Louis Heidsieck.
Q 24The largest standard champagne bottle, twenty bottles' worth, bears which biblical king's name?
Nebuchadnezzar
Most houses cannot riddle anything bigger than a magnum, so giant bottles are usually filled from smaller ones.
Q 25A magnum holds how much champagne?
1.5 litres
Magnums are thought to age better because there is less oxygen per volume of wine, though there is no hard evidence.
Q 26The champagne coupe, first made around 1663 in Greenwich, was originally called what?
A tazza
The factory belonged to the Duke of Buckingham; the legend that it was modelled on Marie Antoinette is a myth.
Q 27Which town's Avenue de Champagne is lined with the leading houses, their cellars cut into the chalk below?
Épernay
Moët & Chandon's headquarters there has the most-photographed statue of Dom Pérignon at its entrance.
Q 28The cathedral of Reims, the region's largest city, was the traditional site of what?
The coronation of French kings
The Holy Ampulla of anointing oil was said to have been brought by a dove at the baptism of Clovis in 496.
Q 29The 'Champagne Hillsides, Houses and Cellars' joined the UNESCO World Heritage List in which year?
2015
The listing recognises the chalk cellars, the houses and the vineyards as an internationally renowned agro-industrial enterprise.
Q 30Sabrage, opening a bottle with a sabre, is traditionally linked to the light cavalry of which leader?
Napoleon
One story has his officers sabring bottles to impress the young widow Clicquot as they rode off from her vineyard.