Pop your cork with our wine expert's guide to festive fizz

There is only one way to celebrate the arrival of Christmas and that is with a glass of really good fizz. I always drink bubbly whilst opening presents with the children on Christmas morning.

One of the nicest ways of starting the day is by making an especially festive Bucks Fizz. Mix it half and half with fresh blood orange juice (it’s a most amazing deep red), or try it with pink grapefruit juice. Peach juice will turn this fizzy cocktail into a Bellini.

I don’t recommend using champagne for these cocktails. Instead take advantage of the many good value offers on Spanish cava this Christmas:

• Tesco have a special half price deal on a limited amount of 6 packs of their Millennium Cava, on sale at £17.99 (equivalent to £2.99 a bottle). In addition, the standard Tesco Cava is at a special reduced price of £3.49.
• Marks & Spencer have reduced their standard cava from £5.50 to £3.99 (dry and medium dry) and their vintage 1997 cava is down from £7.99 to £5.99.
• Aldi supermarket has reduced its champagne from £9.99 a bottle to £7.89.

Light, apéritif champagnes
This is the time to indulge in some really good champagne. All the supermarkets have sound own-label examples. Current favourites include: Tesco Blanc de Noir Champagne (£11.99), Marks & Spencer Oudinot Champagne (down from £13.99 to £9.99), and Somerfield Prince William 1er Cru (£13.99).

The best-known non-vintage champagnes vary massively in style. If you favour light, zippy, apéritif-style champagne, go for Lanson Black Label (around £22.00), Pol Roger White Foil (£23.00 to £25.00) or Heidsieck Monople, great value at around £15.00.

Medium-bodied champagnes
Easy-drinking, top-of-the-range champagnes I’ve enjoyed in this category recently include Moët & Chandon NV (around £20.00) and the ice-cream-soda-like Mumm Cordon Rouge (around £20.00). Look out for these in magnums (Oddbins, Majestic Wine Warehouses and Threshers often have a good choice), as they both look good and with 1.5 litres in a bottle, serve up to 12 glasses.

Fizz with attitude
If you are a lover of much richer, full-bodied bubbly, indulge in a bottle of Veuve Clicquot Yellow Label (around £25.00), Louis Roederer Non-Vintage (around £25.00), or Bollinger (about £28.00). All these wines taste excellent with food and you can easily serve them through Christmas lunch. If you fancy having a special Christmas Eve meal with lobster or oysters, again these hefty sparklers will hit the spot.

If money is no object, you can’t go wrong with Krug Grande Cuvée, deliciously rich and nutty. And so it should be at around £75.00 a bottle.

Vintage champagne
If you want to push the boat out and indulge in a vintage, look around and see if you can find any wines from the stunning 1990 vintage. Waitrose’s 1990 is fabulous value at £18.99 a bottle. For other well-known houses, such as Louis Roederer or Bollinger, expect to pay around £45.00.

Seriously big bottles
If you are planning a big party, and like really big impressive bottles, Waitrose currently have limited stocks of Jeroboams (3 litres, equivalent to 4 bottles) of Louis Roederer Non Vintage (£150.00) and Charles Heidsieck Brut 1982 at £300.00. Be warned, you need to be quite strong to pour from these majestic bottles.

Demi-sec champagne
These champagnes, to which an extra dose of sugar has been added, are currently enjoying something of a revival. They are nothing like as sweet as the grapey Italian fizz, Asti; more in between that and a standard Brut champagne. Not only do they taste good with pudding (especially sherry trifle), they are also delicious with lots of quite rich or creamy starters such as scallops or salmon with hollandaise. Try Nicolas Feuillatte Demi-Sec (£17.99 Asda), Piper Heidsieck (£18.99 Tesco) or supermarket own-label examples at around £13.00.