These days, wine bars are the new neighborhood taverns. In Montrose, you’ll find some of the smartest wine guys in town at Camerata on Westheimer, which serves the same knowledgeable, but tragically underfunded, neighborhood crowds as Paulie’s, the Italian restaurant next door. While I enjoyed the Tasmanian rosé and Loire Valley crémant I tried there, Camerata only serves charcuterie plates and cheese, and neither pairs all that well with sparkling wine, if you ask me. (They are thinking about offering a limited menu of Paulie’s sandwiches, but none were available the night I visited.) 

At Crú Wine Bar, the young bartender asked me to rank the three sparkling wines sitting in front of me. I had ordered the “Everyone Loves Bubbles” flight—three half glasses served side by side. When I told him I liked the J Cuvée 20 (the number refers to an anniversary release), a crisply acidic, medium-priced California bubbly, he disagreed with my assessment and told me that the other two were better. A strange quasi-argument ensued.

I pointed out that the Henriot “Souverain” French champagne had a gamy Pinot noir aroma and the Col de’Salici Italian rosé, while lovely, was slightly sweet. And since I was eating Cru Wine Bar’s excellent fritto misto, a plate of fried calamari and shrimp that he himself had recommended, the lemony wine was just the thing. But the impeccably groomed young man wouldn’t budge from his well-rehearsed opinion. Oh, well. You might not learn much about wine at Cru, but I hear it’s a great place for singles to hook up.  

Sonoma Wine Bar on Yale in the Heights, furnished with lots of sofas, is the place of choice when you’re already dating—or married. When I visited, the couches were occupied by snuggling couples, so I sat at the bar a few seats away from a white-haired codger in a cowboy hat and his talkative date. I sampled a glass of Domaine Carneros, a rich, yeasty bubbly from the California winery owned by French Champagne house Taittinger.

The crisp acidity of the cold, fizzy wine paired well with a basket of piping-hot fish and chips made with Gulf grouper. The fish was a little under-seasoned, so I doused it with malt vinegar and sprinkled on some salt. It was a pleasant pairing, but not as impressive as the duck breast slider in barbecue sauce on a bao bun with a glass of Piper-Heidsieck Champagne at the cozy, lounge-like Absolve Wine Bar on Studemont not far away. 

If you used to like champagne and caviar back in the days of beluga and sevruga, go to the tiny Vinoteca Poscol and try the crisp, mineral-tasting Italian sparkling Verdicchio with bruschetta topped with the Sardinian dried fish roe called bottarga. It ain’t Iranian caviar, but it does taste like fish eggs. 

Or head to Vine Wine Room, a shabby chic hangout on Memorial decorated with knickknacks and used furniture, where you can sample the amazing combination of Jacquart non-vintage French Champagne with tarama—the ridiculously rich creamy Greek spread made with carp roe. On my visit, I also sampled the worst sparkling wine of the tour: Coppola Winery’s “Sofia” comes in a can and tastes like alcoholic 7-Up. 

My wife and I sampled another flight of sparkling wines at the Vinoteca wine bar next to Quattro restaurant in the Four Seasons Hotel, where the hotel lobby ambiance is mitigated by excellent deals on appetizers. When you order a flight of sparkling wines, you also get a plate of four crostini—topped with marinated mushrooms; chopped artichoke hearts; black olive tapenade and mortadella; and fruit and cheese. 

Of the wines, my wife preferred the Poema cava, a Spanish sparkler, over a prosecco, and the non-vintage Louis Roederer French Champagne. We also sampled a pizza topped with three kinds of mushrooms, which tasted great with the bubblies.

You may be thinking that this pairing thing is a little suspect, because really, champagne tastes good with anything. But I disproved that adage at one of my favorite haunts, 13 Celsius, arguably the coolest wine bar in town. The bartender and I agreed that the white anchovy appetizer on the eclectic small-plates menu would be a great pairing with bubbly, so I put in my order. 

After studying the wine list for a while, I decided on a glass of the intriguing-sounding Côté Mas Crémant Rose from France’s Languedoc region, a pink sparkling wine made with Chardonnay, Chenin Blanc, and Pinot Noir grapes. It was a fabulous wine with wonderful, berry-like aromas and flavors that would have been perfect with dessert—but with the intensely flavored fish, it was a disaster. Think strawberry shortcake topped with anchovies. I’m open to experimentation, but this was possibly the worst champagne and food pairing of all time.

After a long day of shopping, The Tasting Room in CityCentre, a cavernous wine bar with an enormous wrap-around patio, is a pleasant place to unwind. It was here that I had my favorite sparkling wine and food combo. Alongside a glass of Perrier Jouët Belle Artes, an expensive French Champagne with an aroma of orange zest and a bright citrus, I got a plate of luscious, dry-smoked Scottish salmon served with capers, onions, cornichons, and slices of Slow Dough Bakery’s pretzel bread baguette. 

You need to put that combo on your Christmas list. 

A Drinker’s Glossary

• Blanc de blanc: Literally “white from white,” usually 100 percent Chardonnay.
• Blanc de noir: “White from black,” a white wine made with a red grape such as Pinot noir or Pinot meunier.
• Brut: It literally means “natural,” but in the case of champagne, it really means “dry.” Brut is drier than Extra Dry.
• Cava: Spanish sparkling wine that often beats Champagne in blind tastings and costs a lot less.
• Champagne: True Champagne is made only in the French Champagne region, but some wineries in the US use the name anyway. When the word “champagne” is not capitalized, it is being used as a generic term for sparkling wine.
• Méthode Champenoise: Fermented in the bottle by the expensive Champagne process. 
• Crémant: French sparkling wines with fewer bubbles (about two-thirds the pressure of Champagne) produced outside of the Champagne region.
• Prosecco: Italian sparkling wines favored by many wine drinkers for great tastes at a reasonable price.
• Vintage: Champagnes made from wines produced in a single exceptional year. These vary widely in character from one vintage to another.  
• Non-vintage: Champagnes made by blending wines produced in several different years. Non-vintage Champagnes are consistent in taste from year to year.