WTN/Wine Advisor: Nouveau Beaujolais: Good and bad news

[Robin Garr]

(EDITOR'S NOTE: In retrospect, I think what we have here is an idiosyncratic wine: A Nouveau that doesn't taste like Nouveau because the late-ripening, cool-summer Beaujolais vintage of 2010 yielded fruit that couldn't be brought up to traditional bowl-O-fruit standards. Absent that, Duboeuf actually ended up with a non-spoofy, tart, reasonably balanced food-friendly wine that card-carrying members of the anti-flavor wine elite like me can embrace.)

This was going to be the year that I didn't write about the arrival of the Beaujolais Nouveau. I've been writing about wine since 1982, and that means I've had to come up with almost 30 different ways to tell this annual story. I'm ready for a break.

What's more, there's mounting evidence that the Nouveau trend, running since soon after World War II, has peaked and gone into free fall: Sales of Nouveau have dropped by half since 2005. That's a marker that would have any sensible buyer selling off his stocks, although a still-respectable 26 million bottles will be sold this year, the lion's share of them from "the King of Beaujolais," Georges Duboeuf.

And to put the icing on the cake, a cool, late-ripening harvest of Beaujolais' Gamay grapes this autumn held promise of thin, "green" and tartly acidic little wines, mean potions that would be hard for the most skilled PR-meister to spin as appealing.

No, this would be a good year to pass. But then I dropped in to my neighborhood wine store, The Wine Rack, and there stood the affable proprietor John Johnson holding out a sparkling glass and a bottle bearing a bright-orange label and Duboeuf's logo.

I took a look, a sniff, then a taste. Hmm.

Georges Duboeuf 2010 Beaujolais Nouveau ($10.99)

It was definitely drinkable, but not at all what I expected in a Nouveau. A pretty color, a clear, medium-dark reddish-violet. It didn't show me the much-maligned "banana" character that wine geeks love to hate in Nouveau but something much more pleasant, light, fresh strawberries; Johnson picked up a touch of cherry, too, and I think he was right. On the palate it wasn't thin or mean but properly acidic in mouth-watering style, with light strawberry fruit, a pleasant earthy note, and a surprising edge of tannic astringency that I wouldn't have expected to find in a Nouveau.

Very different from the pattern for this familiar autumn wine, it's acidic, all right, with fruit that's restrained and balanced without Nouveau's frequent tutti-frutti excesses, and a flavor profile of fruit, acidity and tannins that will make it an exceptional food match. I think I may have my selection for Thanksgiving Dinner.

I don't know how long this happy balance would last, and I suggest the traditional approach of enjoying the Nouveau now and drinking it up soon. But I'm guessing that what we have here is Duboeuf's canny approach (and high-technology winery tools and tricks) making the best of a late harvest with generally unpromising fruit.

Perhaps this is why, in the face of declining sales, Duboeuf will account for the lion's share of the 36 million bottles of Nouveau that will still be sold around the world this fall.

WEB LINK: Georges and Franck Duboeuf's Beaujolais Nouveau page is colorful but relies heavily on Flash.
http://www.duboeuf.com/index.php?lang=e ... eaujolais2

FIND THIS WINE ONLINE:

Duboeuf Beaujolais Nouveau should be available everywhere, widely available at lower prices than my local $11 toll. Click to compare prices and find vendors on Wine-Searcher.com.
http://www.wine-searcher.com/find/Duboe ... g_site=WLP

Robin, the three BNs I tasted yesterday were all noticeably less buble-gummy and thin than the customary Noember 18 plonk. As you say, the Duboeuf is fruity and drinkable, but I thought the Drouhin a bit upscale from that and the Pierre Chermette a better product than the previous two. Would I suggest anyone in this forum buy any of them? No, but everything is relative and I have the impression this year's offerings may be better than their predecessors.

Speaking of Chermette, I ran into the 2009 PIERRE-MARIE CHERMETTE FLEURIE PONCIE at a 2009 Beaujolais tasting last week and fell in love with it. I go years without buying any sort of Beaujolais but I bought a half-case of this juicy crus, which apparently has the stuffing to age a while. But I'm sure mine won't be around at the end of the year.

I agree with Robin, this vintage (as well as the last several) are fun-to-drink wines, but they are just that, not something to buy a case of (heck, for almost the same price you can probably get a very drinkable '08 Cru Beaujolais that will clearly over-shadow the Nouveau). This is only a salute to the current vintage, "we made wine", which may not always be the case, a Kool-Aid kind of "communion to Bacchus". I am afraid that too many of us want to Poo-Poo it as a less than worthy wine, while it is not necessarily meant to be judged, only celebrated. And it is all the rage to denigrate George DuBoeuf for his tireless promotion of Beaujolais, but if other negociants were as dedicated as he, old world wine would perhaps be much better understood buy the rest of the world.
If you choose to save you money, so be it, though it is worth enough as a Thanksgiving "side-board" wine, just give it a little air and chill it down to 56-58 deg.

[Robin Garr]

I agree with Robin, this vintage (as well as the last several) are fun-to-drink wines, but they are just that, not something to buy a case of

I might quibble about total agreement, Richard, insofar as I found the 2009 Beaujolais - including the better Nouveau - as an exceptional vintage well above average for the region. I even loved all the Duboeufs.

We happened to buy the DuBoeuf Beaujolais (only $5.88 here) the day before Robin's posting. We liked it and bought more for Thanksgiving.