More Than Just Nouveau

More than Just Nouveau

One of my favorite topics of discussion is Beaujolais, the wine that so many people seem to love to hate. Of course they are thinking about that Nouveau juice that comes out every third week in November in pretty flowered bottles with usually Georges Duboeuf’s name on the label. It is light and fruity and goes well with turkey. Not meant for ageing, it should be consumed over the holidays. I have enjoyed bottles of this over time and it is always a fun seasonal kind of wine. BUT… Nouveau is not where Beaujolais ends. Far from it!! It extends far from the classic bistro wine of Paris that is served in pint glass bottles known as pot.

The Gamay grape, which the Duke of Burgundy, Philippe the Bold outlawed in 1395 calling it “a very bad and disloyal plant” produces more wine than the rest of Burgundy combined. There are more than 96 villages producing wine in the region. This translates to over75 million bottles produced a year!!
My focus here, is Cru Beaujolais, the highest classification of wines in the region. There are ten different villages that produce quite different wines even though, they are using the same Gamay grape. Unlike their Nouveau cousin that makes use of carbonic maceration so that fermentation can take place in as little as four days, these wines have a longer fermentation time which equals more tannins and a fuller body. You also have a range of soil types and vineyard altitudes with upper slopes having schist and granite based soils with a touch of limestone and the lower slopes having soils made up of clay and stone. This in part, accounts for the different flavors imparted from each village wine.

I have divided the villages into three sections: light bodied, medium bodied and full bodied. The wines from this first section are meant to be drunk with three years of the vintage. They are Brouilly, Regnie and Chiroubles. Brouilly is the largest of all the Crus . Regnie is believed by locals the first vineyards planted by the Romans. The wines here are a little more full-bodied . Chiroubles wines are known for delicate wines with aromas of violets.
The next group are medium-bodied and can use a year of ageing in the bottle and then can be drunk within four years of the vintage. Cote de Brouilly, Fleurie and Saint Amour make up this group. The wines of the Cote, (slope), are less earthy and much more concentrated then their neighboring Brouilly. Fleurie is widely distributed in the U.S. so may sound familiar to some of you. These wines are among my favorites and have a velvety smoothness to them. They also can last up to 16 years! Saint –Amour wines are a little more spicy and can have pleasing peach aromas. These wines can have a cellar life of up to 12 years.

The last group is made up of the villages of Chenas, Julienas, Morgon and Moulin-a-Vent. The wines in this group can develop such structure and complexity that they can rival other Burgundian reds. Who would have thought that Beaujolais could produce wines like these when critics have often used the word JELLO to describe the regions flavors!! Chenas is the smallest of the Crus and sticking your nose into a glass of this and you can smell wild roses. These wines can last up to 15 years. Julienas is named after Julius Caesar a big wine drinker during his time who spent time here during his conquest of Gaul. There are deep rich and spicy flavors in these wines. Morgon is my all time favorite Beaujolais and is very dark in color and has a lingering silky finish. I also love their apricot and peachy nose. Moulin-a-Vent comes in a close second and you have to look twice at the label to believe that it is a Beaujolais. These wines are the longest lasting and most structured of the group. These wines can go up to20 years in the bottle. These wines see more oak ageing and may often have futs de chene, (oak casks), on the label.

My challenge to you is go out and find and try some of these “other” Beaujolais. I am sure that you will agree with my friend, N.Y. Times wine critic Eric Asimov, that these wines are “seductive” with surprising complexity. They are more than just Nouveau.

Cheers
Alan