Nouveau options for your Thanksgiving table
A couple of months ago, the Houston Wine Merchant’s Antonio Gianola asked if he could submit a take on his favorite Beaujolais wines, specifically requesting to run his thoughts today. Such is my respect for Gianola’s taste buds — we’ve known each other since his days of shaping the excellent wine program at Catalan on Washington back in the mid-aughts — that I’d have replied, “Antonio, go for it!” no matter his topic or the date.
His timing couldn’t have been more perfect. Although he didn’t reference Thanksgiving in his original request or in what he ultimately wrote, I’ve always thought the gamay grape, certainly as the most serious French winegrowers showcase it in the hills north of Lyon, is perfect for the challenges that confront us with the jumble of Turkey Day flavors. (Note, nothing pairs well with that sweet-potato-andmarshmallow glop.) Better still, even big-boy Beaujolais can be budget friendly if a large crowd will be gathering around the table.
However, one huge problem with the Beaujolais-Thanksgiving pairing is the unfortunate fact that Beaujolais Nouveau is always released on the third Thursday in November, in high Thanksgiving season. It’s too often insipid stuff, an over-hyped byproduct of one of the most brilliant marketing schemes of all time. Historically, we came to associate Thanksgiving and Beaujolais with these un-evolved 6-week-old wines that are first and foremost designed to generate money for (almost) nothing while making use of surplus so-so fruit.
But I do feel a bit bad saying this because Franck Duboeuf, son of the legendary Georges Duboeuf, was in town with his wife, Anne, last week to promote his Nouveau releases, and he was an extremely nice, humble gentleman. Georges Duboeuf ’s name is virtually synonymous with Beaujolais, and his family has profited hugely from the bells and whistles surrounding the Nouveau release, selling more bottles than any other producer.
Duboeuf even now hosts an annual contest for artists to design each vintage’s label, a competition won in 2019 — from among some 600 entries — by Dallas artist Laura Runge. Her piece, called “Joyous Crush,” will appear on about a million Duboeuf bottles, including a Nouveau rosé.
It’s definitely a cool image, one designed, she said, “to have the look and feel of celebration. There is a depiction of the wine itself, surrounded by subtle bursts of confetti to evoke that joyous feel.”
Despite 2019 being a superdifficult vintage in Beaujolais, the Duboeuf Nouveaus — a rosé among them — exceeded my (admittedly low) expectations. But I’d still be more likely inclined to pick up the regular wines from the 2017 vintage, particularly the always reliable Duboeuf Beaujolais Villages, which can be had for under 10 bucks around town — literally pennies more than the Nouveau at outlets such as Spec’s.
And two 2018 Beaujolais Cru wines made under the Duboeuf umbrella that Franck also brought to showcase, the Château des Capitans Juliénas and the Domaine des Rosiers Moulinà-Vent, are tempting options, too, although at higher prices ($22 and $27, respectively). But they won’t help for this Thanksgiving because they aren’t being released until early 2020.
Another suggestion: Read the next few paragraphs. I haven’t yet personally tasted Gianola’s suggestions since the wines are just now arriving in the market. But I look forward to the experience, strongly suspecting they will strike all the right notes, even though they are Nouveaus.
What follows here, he readily admits, is a personal “love letter to Beaujolais, as there is an honesty and primal directness to Beaujolais that calls to me like a soft, sweet song that intensifies every fall with the return of cooler weather. This is the siren song of Lorelei that wishes to draw one into the joy of eminently quaffable waves of Beaujolais! There are wines for the intellect, and then there are wines for pleasure. These unpretentious wines that provide refreshment and joy at the table in French are called vin
de soif, or what we call quaffing wines. Just sounds prettier in French, doesn’t it? Most things do.
“As one of my favorite wine importers, Kermit Lynch in his book ‘Adventures in the Wine
Route’ said, ‘Beaujolais must be the most inspired invention in the history of wine.’ If time has taught us anything, when Kermit raves about a wine or region, we should all take note.”
To repeat myself, ditto Gianola. Beaujolais must be 100 percent gamay to be legal in France and, Gianola admits, “It’s a grape often historically disparaged by Charlemagne (a man of great discipline, the great emperor, it seems, was a near-teetotaler) and various other anti-pleasure-loving people who ordered either planting bans or that it be pulled from the ground. The most prestigious wines of the zone are the Crus of renown, but Nouveau is special in its own right as it is the first taste of the harvest that has just happened, and a vinous hint of what the future holds as the more Crus of Beaujolais age and come into their own.
“The wines pair favorably with so many different dishes and cuisines and with such ease — paté, roasted chicken (and turkey, of course), grilled fish and with a light chill on the bottle even oysters on the half shell.”
But, when it comes to Nouveau, Gianola insists, it pays to buy small. (Sorry, Franck!) Largeproduction Nouveau is not the same thing. Houston Wine Merchant offers two Nouveaus from boutique family wineries, the 2019 Domaine Dupeuble and the 2019 Domaine de la Prébende. Both sell for $19.99 with additional formats of 1.5 liter and 3 liters available from Dupeuble.
“They are made in a hands-off approach in the cellar and make for a hands-on experience at the table — nothing added, nothing taken out,” he said. “The lack of manipulation in these wines leaves more room for pure, unadulterated deliciousness. This is the way wine was intended to be and something to be thankful for every day. They are delicious to drink, full of fruit and fizz and vim and vigor. Humble in origins but such pleasure in the glass.”
And so well suited for gobble, gobbling. Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!