Ever since 1985, when Beaujolais Nouveau first started breezing over from France every November, the young, fruity red wine, a k a the “purple slurper,” has been the subject of ridicule.
Wine snobs have criticized it for smelling and even tasting like banana candy or bubble gum or both. Karen MacNeil, author of “The Wine Bible,” once compared drinking Beaujolais Nouveau to “eating cookie dough.”
But times have changed. A more serious class of growers in the rolling Beaujolais wine region north of Lyon are taking Nouveau to a new level, and nature has been cooperating. The past three vintages have all been excellent, and though 2012 was threatened by miserable weather early in the summer, it could be just as good, thanks to decent weather before harvest, lower yields and careful winemaking.
This year’s vintage, which hits shelves tomorrow — the third Thursday in November, by tradition — is expected to be wonderfully ripe and intense yet still gentle, and play well with turkey and all the fixings. Beaujolais Nouveau’s “tart underlayer will work with the cranberry sauce as well as the bird,” says Jason Hopple, wine director at North End Grill in Battery Park City.
The chief culprit afflicting Nouveau in years past was thought to be engineered yeasts — as opposed to natural vineyard and winery yeasts — designed to ferment the wine fast, so that it could be rushed to market. But those yucky lab yeasts have been largely pushed out of the picture. “Thanks to some yeasts we once used, there were extreme tastes and aromas,” admits Franck Duboeuf, the president of Georges Duboeuf, the dominant Beaujolais producer. “In the last 20 years, we’ve gotten much closer to the character of the grapes.”
Frédéric Drouhin, fourth-generation head of a family wine firm that makes Burgundy wines selling for hundreds of dollars per bottle, as well as Nouveau, echoes Duboeuf. “We ran away from the banana taste,” he says. “For 2012, the indigenous yeasts are quite strong.”
That banana-rama factor isn’t only due to a yeast problem, insists Bruno Bererd, winemaker at Domaine de la Madone, a well-respected medium-size winery in the renowned northern part of the Beaujolais region. He blames unripe grapes harvested in a hurry so that the wine can be rushed to market — something, he says, that isn’t practiced at his winery. “We pick a full week later than some of our neighbors who are selling their wine in bulk to Duboeuf,” he notes.
Another quality-first Nouveau producer, Damien Dupeuble of 500-year-old Domaine Dupeuble, also waits “no matter how long it takes, for full maturity of the grapes.” Premature harvesting can’t be compensated for by hocus-pocus in the winery, Dupeuble insists, ticking off oenology no-no’s like “chaptalizing [adding sugar], de-acidifying and using all sorts of additives to extract color and tannin.” (Such practices are secretly used not only with Beaujolais Nouveau but also whenever any wine needs “tweaking.”)
But many in the wine world still reach for the spit bucket when they hear all this talk of nature and nurture combining to produce niftier Nouveau. For them, it remains a rush job, more to deliver cash flow to growers than to deliver a quality quaff to consumers. “Not enough effort goes into the production of Nouveau to result in the quality I’m looking for,” snipes Olivier Flosse, wine director of A Voce Madison and Columbus, two restaurants that boast high-end wine lists.
Wine importer Victor Schwartz of VOS Selections offers a wide range of French bottles but draws the line at Nouveau. “It’s not serious, it’s a beverage as opposed to a wine,” he says. “It’s like Tang for astronauts.”
“Astronaut Tang” and cookie-dough comparisons aside, many in the city, even those who frequent brownstone Brooklyn’s trendier wine shops, welcome Beaujolais Nouveau’s arrival — especially when the bottles come from small, boutique winemakers. “We have a lot of customers into light reds, and we always sell out our Nouveau pretty quickly,” says Max Davis, wine buyer at Smith & Vine in Carroll Gardens, where you won’t find Duboeuf on the shelves but you will find several artisanal Beaujolais Nouveaus, including Jean-Paul Brun’s Terres Dorées. At Thirst Wine Merchants in Fort Greene, co-owner Michael Yarmark says most of his customers are excited by the young wine. The only customers “who turn up their noses at Nouveau,” he says, are French folks.
The rest of us should just enjoy the fruity, fun wine while we can, says Alexis Kahn, wine director at the new Upper East Side wine bar ABV. “Nouveau is a nice way to celebrate the harvest, and it’s a great aperitif and highly quaffable — just enjoy it in the moment.”
Suggested sips
While French regulations forbid tasting the new vintage until 12:01 a.m.on the third Thursday of November, based on previous vintages, these are producers you can count on in 2012:
Maison Joseph Drouhin
($9.95 at Morrell & Co., 1 Rockefeller Plaza; 212-688-9370) This elite Burgundy house first produced Nouveau in 1959, and its recent vintages still do a light dance on the palate. The pretty 2012 label is by Frédéric Drouhin’s 14-year-old daughter, Romane.
Domaine Dupeuble
($15 at Thirst Wine Merchants, 187 DeKalb Ave., Fort Greene; 718-596-7643) This pick is another Nouveau dialed up to the richer end of the spectrum. When lesser examples begin to fade, this vintage should still be cranking.
Maison P-U-R
($17.95 at Frankly Wines, 66 West Broadway; 212-346-9544)
A “natural” Beaujolais Nouveau meant to faithfully reflect the purity of the new vintage — low in alcohol and light in color. Think of it as a wine without makeup.
Domaine de la Madone
($14.95 at Blanc & Rouge, 81 Washington St., DUMBO; 718-858-9463) With its ample, cherry-leaning flavor, this lip-smacker isn’t too shy to mingle with whatever’s on your holiday table.
Georges Duboeuf
(widely available at $9.95) Yes, it’s mass- produced (145,000 cases in 2012), but Nouveau’s marketing marvel has been in top form lately. Fresh, lively and a total “no-brainer” — just what the vintage’s first red wine should be.