Champagne Wishes & Caviar Dreams
Robin Leach – host of the 80’s television series, Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous – provided humorous descriptions of yachts, mansions and private jets on his show. He signed off wishing his viewers, champagne wishes and caviar dreams.
When I was a child, my mother used to indulge in a champagne while playing vintage movie songs. Waltzing around the dining table she’d sing along to the lyrics of Gigi:
The night they invented champagne
It’s plain as it can be
They thought of you and me …
Unfortunately nobody has definitively been able to establish who invented champagne – but the French monk Dom Perignon is thought to have invented champagne in 1697.
Personally I love the romance of Dom Perignon yelling, ‘Come quickly, I am tasting the stars!’
However, some British historians reckon in 1662 a scientist, Christopher Merrett, documented how to make sparkling wine.
As a child, it seemed to me that becoming an adult must be a marvellous thing, because it would involve a lot of champagne and much hilarity. So by the time I could legally drink, I’d already developed a predisposition to fine champagne.
At university most of my friends didn’t have the loot for French imported champagnes such as Perrier-Jouët or Veuve Clicquot, so we made do with Australian sparkling wines. Many were first-rate but others were dodgy and tasted suspiciously of aerated fruit syrups. But when I found vacation work as a nightclub cocktail girl, I diligently applied myself to learning all about French champagne and premium cocktails
I was in heaven when I was promoted to creating the cocktails and popping champagne corks, instead of working the floor armed only with a flimsy tray, fending off the attentions of inebriated males.
Working alongside the barmen and having a metre width of polished oak between me and the clientele changed the game. Under the dim lights and the glittering backlit liqueur bottles, with a silver cocktail shaker firmly in hand, I felt like I’d finally attained adulthood. Whoa, did I get that wrong!
I loved the après work perks at the nightclub. In the midnight hours we’d sit around the empty club talking, laughing and having a cocktail or three.
Champagne cocktails were in vogue and I quickly realised that late at night champagne could effortlessly morph into becoming a truth serum. It got me into a hell of a lot of trouble but so much fun. Oh la la.
Winston Churchill was an absolute fiend for champagne and Oscar Wilde frequently referenced the joys of imbibing champagne. As he wrote, ‘Only the unimaginative can fail to find a reason for drinking Champagne.’
However the actor, composer, lyricist and champagne aficionado Noel Coward should really have the last word –
‘Why do I drink champagne for breakfast? Doesn’t everyone?’