A Beaujolais gets no respect

Wine class again last night, goys and birls. I had a couple of glasshes. It was good shtuff.

OK, I know that's bad, but I'll leave it in just because it will annoy a couple of people and you all know that amuses me.

So we had Ted, the teacher/store representative, who resembles Bob Newhart, and Ted, the guy who looks like Sean Connery, and is a cool guy attending the classes, as I have said already. Mr. C was late and missed a good portion of Ted's usual lengthy preamble, getting there just when the wine was poured. Bastard. All the payoff and none of the pain.

The cheeses were very dramatic this time. Exhibit A, an aged goats milk cheese from a NY farm. I won't say the name because frankly, I gagged on the cheese, it was so strong and stinky. I don't want to harm this farm's reputation with my lack of sophisticated taste buds, so they shall remain anonymous.

Mind you, there is a couple in this series of classes we will call the Brownnosers. The Browns sit at the end of the table RIGHT next to Ted, and greet him in French each evening, and just generally exude "aren't we such fabulous, sophisticated wine experts?" They drive me crazy. This is NOT Manhattan, kids. Get over yourselves. It's a little wine shop in upstate NY.

The Browns, of course, luhved the stinky goat cheese. I swear to you, if dryer lint were soaked in the sweat of Bruce Jenner's scary post-plastic-surgery face, it would be more appealing.

Moving on.

The other cheese hit it completely out of the park. It was a smoked Gouda, from Clover Mead Farm, again in NY. Oh my gahd, it was delicious. Smoked tenderly over apple wood, I covertly fought my brother in law for every last morsel. So much for the diet, which is distressing because I AM GOING TO BE 40 SOON PEOPLE, 4-0, AND THERE WILL BE A PARTY AND WHAT THE HELL AM I GOING TO WEAR???

Wait... this was supposed to be about the wine.

SO... you most likely have heard the word Beaujolais followed by the word "Nouveau". Beaujolais Nouveau is a special 7- to 9 week old wine that is released with much fanfare on the Third Thursday of November. Seriously. The Concorde used to fly this stuff around the world so the wealthy could have it as soon as it was released. It is meant to be drunk very young. As in, try to drink it the same year, before New Year's Eve.

Beaujolais is in the southern part of France's Burgundy region and focuses on Gamay grapes for red wines. Beaujolais winemakers have a process called carbonic maceration*, which makes a wine that can be consumed early.

(*CM : used during primary fermentation to produce light red wines with low tannins, intense color, and fresh, fruity flavors and aromas. Dump whole bunches of freshly picked, uncrushed grapes into large vats filled with carbon dioxide and a good wine yeast. The bottom grapes are crushed by the ones above, and fermentation begins. This develops more carbon dioxide gas, which envelops the upper layers of uncrushed grapes and blocks air exposure that would normally occur. Soon, fermentation begins within the whole grapes, and they begin to ooze more juice. Finally the whole batch is pressed, and fermenetation is finished in a standard way --- Barron's Educational Services, Inc 1995 based on The Wine Lover's Companion, by Ron Herbst and Sharon Tyler Herbst)


As an experiment (can you say "can we still sell this old Beujolais Nouveau"? ) Ted had us try a bottle of last year's Beujolais Nouveau (I'm getting so sick of typing that out because I have to think very hard about all of those damn vowels.) He was very upfront and told us that he wanted to see if it was still a good tasting wine. Fair enough. I have no problem with that.

Sister and law and I, as well as Mr. C, all enjoyed it. It was a 2004 Beujolais Nouveau (Domaine de la Madone? that's what's on my notes sheet but it seems incomplete) and was about $11.

Ted thought it was still fairly good, and described it as fruity, tasting like a raspberry popsicle or wild strawberry flavor. It was pretty easy to drink. The Browns apparently found it boring.

The next wine was a Beaujolais, not a Beujolais Nouveau, but rather one aged in the traditional fashion. The wine we had was a just released, Carquelin Moulin a Vent 2004. This is a wine by Georges Duboeuf, and if you have some time go google about the scandal where he was caught basically mislabelling wines for profit. Heh.

Ted described this wine as a bit more earthy/ musty and still tasting young. In other words, leave it in the bottle another year or two in a cool dark place. However it was still very good and in my little clique it was the one we liked the best or second best. Again, not good enough for the Browns.

The third wine was Chateau de la Terriere 2001, Jules du Souzy. Once more, apologies if this is not the right set of words in the proper order. (My brother in law elicited horrified gasps from the Browns by muttering "House of the Dog?". I heart him. Ted/Sean Connery pointed out in a very friendly way that it's French for terrain, not terrier.) So, a slightly older Beaujolais, and one more for the experienced wine taster... because it smelled very earthy and musty. (Yes, like a wet dog, if you think like my brother in law.) Ted/Bob Newhart gushed over this one "I could just stand here and smell it over and over" and "I'm intoxicated by the smell" and so on. Ehh. The Browns loved it. Suck ups.

Try a Beaujolais with a nice roast chicken, and chill the wine slightly. And don't forget, if it's Nouveau, don't stick in in your cellar for your toddler's high school graduation.