Small-producer Champagne in Lucca, by the glass

A bottle of grower Champagne doesn’t arrive at the table to put on a show. It arrives because, after a Brunello or a Bolgheri, it can be the right way to change pace without changing the evening. At Tomkat, at Via Calderia 12, just steps from Piazza San Michele, grower Champagne sits alongside Tuscany and the France that truly interests us: not an obligatory interlude, but a deliberate choice.

We are a wine bar with a kitchen open in the evening, Monday through Saturday. Many guests come in looking for a glass of Sangiovese, a Chianti Classico, a Brunello di Montalcino or a Bolgheri. That’s natural: you are in Lucca, and Tuscany comes first. Then someone looks at the list, finds Champagne, Burgundy and Bordeaux, and dinner takes a different direction.

Our cellar holds almost 200 Italian and French labels, selected bottle by bottle and updated every week. The numbers are not meant to impress. They help us find, every evening, a sensible bottle for that table, that dish, that moment.

Why we choose grower Champagne

By “grower Champagne,” we do not mean a decorative category. We mean vignerons who work their own vineyards and sign wines with a recognizable identity. In Champagne, this can mean a sharper interpretation of a village, a parcel or a vintage. It can also mean bottles that are less immediate, less designed to please everyone from the first sip.

That is precisely the point. We are not looking for interchangeable Champagnes. We are looking for bottles that have something to say, even when the answer is not comfortable or obvious. A more taut cuvée, a more vinous one, one with greater depth: there is no need to turn the table into a lesson. Just choose well.

The selection changes because availability changes, and because a static list is a list that stops being useful. Some bottles are suited to starting the evening. Others call for a dish and a few more minutes. Still others are for those who came to Lucca also looking for a cellar that is not solely Tuscan.

Tuscany first, Champagne when it matters

We do not offer Champagne as an automatic alternative to local wines. If you feel like Brunello, we have Brunello. If you are looking for Bolgheri, Barolo or Vermentino, we start there. Most of our tables drink Tuscany, and we like it that way.

But there are evenings when the French bottle is the right one. Two people who want to share something different. A table that has already been drinking red wine for a few days and wants to change pace. A guest arriving from London, Amsterdam or New York who asks for a Champagne list with genuine curiosity, not a label placed there out of obligation.

Grower Champagne works well in this space because it does not demand ceremony. It demands attention, which is different. These are wines to drink slowly, between conversation and a shared dish. We do not need to invent a special evening: if the bottle is the right one, it is already doing its job.

For those who live in Lucca, the Plain or Versilia, the reason to return can be simpler: the selection of wines by the glass changes often. We do not promise that every Champagne will always be available by the glass, because it depends on the bottles and how they evolve. But the list moves. And a visit does not have to resemble the previous one.

What to order with Champagne at Tomkat

The kitchen is concise. It helps us work better and avoid distracting from the wine. With a grower Champagne, we can start with the Focaccia y Tomate: focaccia, Campanian tomato, Tuscan olive oil and Maldon salt. You eat it with your hands, share it, and it requires no explanation.

The pantry offers other possibilities. There are cured meats ranging from Culatta di Parma to Jamón 100% Ibérico de Bellota, Italian and French cheeses from Tuscan pecorino to Jura Comté, Gillardeau oysters and caviar. Naturally, not everything calls for the same Champagne. An aged pecorino takes the evening somewhere else than an oyster, and caviar is not an excuse to complicate things.

If you want a more substantial dish, there are sweet-and-sour Pork Ribs and slow-cooked beef roast with chimichurri sauce and tangy beef jus. Here, the choice depends on the bottle. With the ribs, we can look for a Champagne with substance and character. With the beef roast, Tuscany is often the most natural answer. We do not make pairings on principle: we make choices for the table.

This is also the advantage of sitting in a wine bar instead of ordering a bottle blindly. We can start from what you want to drink, rather than from a formula. If there are four of you and you want a Tuscan red after a glass of Champagne, no problem. If you want to stay in France, we can look at Burgundy or Bordeaux. Our Bordeaux Experience includes château from the 1980s onward, for those looking for bottles with time behind them and not just a famous name on the list.

A French list without forgetting Lucca

France is part of our identity, alongside Burgundy, Champagne and Bordeaux. It is also why the list received the Star Wine List Best Newcomer in 2025 and the Best Medium-Sized Wine List award in 2026, as well as the Wine Spectator Best of Award of Excellence in 2025 and 2026.

These are welcome recognitions. But they do not change what happens at the counter or at the tables. Every evening, we have to choose a bottle, open it properly and make those who come in feel good. Anyone in town for one or two nights does not need a statement of intent. They need to drink well tonight, in a central location, without wasting time.

That is why we keep the list broad but not endless. A large list can become an obstacle if no one helps you read it. We are here to point you in a direction: an old Tuscan vintage, a Sangiovese from the area, a glass that changes often, a bottle of grower Champagne. Then you decide how far beyond that you want to go.

If you want to try them with us

Guided tastings can be booked from 20 euros. They are a direct way to focus on one area of the list or compare different styles, without turning the evening into an exam. For private groups, we can build a journey around the cellar and the kitchen, always starting from what you genuinely feel like drinking.

If you are in Lucca this week, feel free to book through OpenTable or call +39 376 203 5395. Come with one simple question - Tuscany or Champagne? - and leave the rest of the conversation to us.

Pier Giulio Bendinelli