Vine Path Blog 11/19: Beaujolais is Back Baby!
The legendary Jules Chauvet
As it stands, for casual wine drinkers, nerds, and industry folk alike, Beaujolais is one of our most favorite wines. It’s the kind of wine with universal appeal, it’s bright and refreshing, savory and fruity, and easy to drink. When you have a good one, it’s hard not to wonder why we aren’t drinking more of it. This hasn’t always been the case however. For drinkers who’ve been in the game long enough they’ll remember the Beaujolais Nouveau fad famous by people like Georges Duboeuf. This defined the world’s understanding of what Beaujolais was as this simple, novelty beverage that was cool to drink only on the third thursday of November (aka Beaujolais Day). These drinks are on the whole, pretty unremarkable, sad, or downright unpleasant, but while all that noise was being made around Nouveau, a small revolution was taking place at the village level in Beaujolais that would make the wines of the region some of the hippest beverages in the wine world today. Step into a trendy wine bar anywhere on earth and you’re guaranteed to find a bunch of open bottles of Gamay from obscure natural winemakers from every village in Beaujolais. Lucky for consumers many of these wines are still readily affordable and somewhat under the radar (though we predict that this is all changing) so you can still get these amazing wines at an awesome value for French wine. This month we’re featuring some of our favorite Beaujolais from four of the region’s revolutionary winemakers and three distinct villages to give you a clear look into what makes this place so special and why you need to forget about Nouveau.
Marcel Lapierre in his element
Best place to start is with Marcel Lapierre, the man who started the modern movement in Beaujolais towards natural wines. Few names in Beaujolais are more revered than his. Starting in 1973, Marcel inherited his father’s domaine in Morgon but it wasn’t until 1981, when he met the now famous winemaker, chemist Jules Chauvet, when things really began to change. Chauvet, while never having no commercially available wines under his own name, is perhaps the most important French winemaker in the modern era. It was his early resistance to the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides along with his ideological commitment to hands-off winemaking that made him the godfather of the natural wine movement. All roads on the natural wine highway lead back to this man and this village, Morgon, and his first pupil, Marcel Lapierre. Marcel was able to galvanize three other Morgon producers, dubbed the Gang of Four by famed wine importer Kermit Lynch, to the lessons of Chauvet and they quickly began producing wines of true character and depth in a place dominated by industrial winemaking and thrifty novelty. The world took notice and now you can find the spiritual heirs of this revolution all over the world, from California to Croatia. We’re offering up Marcel’s Raisins Gaulois since it’s an awesome introduction to great Beaujolais. This declassified Beaujolais is made like all of his wines, organically and without winemaking additions, and is designed to be a fresh and fun example of the style. You get a little bit of everything here, it’s lighthearted and fun but still complex and a bit brooding with that characteristic wild note that’s become a signature of Marcel’s winemaking.
Kewin Descombes
This revolution of thought that started in Morgon quickly spread around greater Beaujolais. Today we have wineries like Terres Dorees, spearheaded by the singular Jean-Paul Brun, making Beaujolais in a traditionally Burgundian fashion, and the children of Descombes, Kewin and Damien Coquelet, producing distinctively wild and modern Gamay. The field has expanded tremendously, with more great Gamay coming out with each passing year. Brun, with his stern and austere Fleurie (which is featured this month), is charting a path unimagined four decades ago. Completely destemmed and fermented with native yeasts, Brun’s Fleurie is the opposite of Raisins Gaulois, which shows more strength and depth than is typical for Gamay. On the other end of the spectrum are the young winemaker’s inheriting the new traditions laid out by Marcel like Kewin Descombes and Damien Coquelet who are making wines with loads of nervous energy, explosive fruit, and a distinctive wild and animal quality. You’ll notice that both Kewin’s Morgon and Damien’s Chiroubles, despite being from distinct terroir, share a similar identity, and it’s this style that’s exciting natural wine fans globally.
Beaujolais is only going to grow in popularity as the wines of northern Burgundy become more and more expensive. Soon everyone will know how great these wines truly are and by them none of us will be able to afford them. You can already see that happening with some of the $50 wines coming out of Fleurie these days. For now, drink up and enjoy before we’re all we’re left with is nostalgia!
Jean-Paul Brun with his impressive line-up