Cru Beaujolais

Beaujolais may be the second most misunderstood wine in the world, after sherry. It's known, often to its detriment, for inexpensive, fruity wine that's designed to be drunk young. There's certainly a lot of that, but it also produces complex, sometimes challenging wines that demand ageing. These wines come from the ten crus, based around spectacularly situated hilltop villages. Vines abound here, crawling up the slopes in incredibly densely planted vineyards. The grape is Gamay, a high-yielding, early-ripening grape that often produces fruity and simple wines. Control those yields, however, and subject the juice to serious vinification and suddenly the grape produces high-quality wine - kind of what happens with any other grape variety in the world.

Fleurie

The problem that Beaujolais has, of course, is Beaujolais Nouveau, a style of wine that's marketed as one to be drunk young rather than to be aged. Beaujolais Nouveau grew out of a series of crises that afflicted the region - phylloxera, subsequent overproduction, and two world wars - and it in effect performed a rescue act that allows us to enjoy the wines of Beaujolais today. There's a place for Beaujolais Nouveau, as after all most people like to drink young, fresh fruity wines for immediate consumption, but it dogs the image of Beaujolais and prevents people understanding that the best wines of the region get better and better with time.

Basic Beaujolais comes from the flat plains to the south of the region, the grapes grown on clay and limestone soils that do little to limit yields. The plains rise to the north, where 38 villages contribute to Beaujolais-Villages, a higher-quality appellation. At the top of the slopes are the ten crus, where the granite-based soils, mixed with quartz, schist, and sand, limit yields and create much more intense wines.

I attended a tasting in San Francisco which featured wines from each cru. There were some fantastic wines on display, demonstrating how the ten crus differ in style and taste. Neighbouring Burgundy successfully markets such intra-regional differences as terroir, causing the wines to command very high prices. Cru Beaujolais is much cheaper, just as varied, and in my opinion just as good: the discerning consumer is in the advantageous position of being able to afford wines of such quality.

The problem that Cru Beaujolais has is not just one of image, but that it's very hard to categorise. Each cru has its own distinct character, and each producer have their own distinct style. Some producers make their wines with a form of carbonic maceration, making their wines softer and fruitier. Others destem and ferment the wines 'normally,' allowing the tannins to express themselves. Few, however, use new oak - and this is a wonderful aspect to Beaujolais as you get to taste the wine rather than the oak.

the ten crus

So, how to make sense of Beaujolais and its varied crus? The simple fact is that each cru and their producers make fantastic wine: it's hard to go wrong. These are very food-friendly wines that go well with salmon, chicken, pork, beef, or game dishes. They can be drunk young because of the natural fruitiness of Gamay, but they can age extremely well too - if you spot an older cru Beaujolais snap it up.

The highlight of the tasting was Domaine Marcel Lapierre's 2015 Morgon. Marcel Lapierre, who died in 2010, was one of the icons of Beaujolais, with a focus on quality and minimal intervention in the winery. The wine was simply incredible: fruity, chewy, ripe, crunchy, and spicy, with a long, warm finish. 2015 was a hot vintage, so the wine is probably bigger than usual, but there's still an elegance and balance to it. If you can get hold of a bottle, it retails for $48. ✪✪✪✪✪✪✪

the ten crus from north to south

Saint-Amour

sales apparently shoot up around Valentine's Day. Yes, that's the culture we live in. The wines are bigger and spicier than most Beaujolais.

Juliénas 

the cru that's in the middle of all Beaujolais's styles, and therefore my favourite: fruity, with some tannins and ageability.

Moulin-à-Vent 

one of the more famous of the crus and one of the more ageable.

Fleurie 

floral and pretty wines that can still age: Clos de la Roilette's Marque Déposée is a great example.

Chiroubles 

we tried Domaine Damien Coquelet, a producer who made his first wine in 2007 when he was twenty. He's trying to revive Chiroubles's reputation and doing a very good job.

Morgon 

there is a verb in French, though I don't know if anyone still uses it: morgonner - to Morgon, which means when a wine becomes like Pinot Noir as it ages. Morgon, like many of the crus, can certainly taste like Pinot Noir as the wine gets older.

Régnié 

the youngest of the crus (it became an appellation in 1988) and high up, the wines are aromatic and best drunk young.

Brouilly 

fruitier and designed for earlier drinking. This is the furthest south of the crus and more like Beaujolais-Villages wines.

Côte de Brouilly 

from the mountain above Brouilly, the wines are much more intense and tannic. For either Brouilly or Côte de Brouilly, try Château Thivin.
 

Crossings

Wine geeks get very excited about clonal selection. "Is the clone Calera, Swan, or 777?" they'll ask when tasting a Pinot Noir, a question that means nothing to the typical drinker. These are clones which have been developed over the years by winemakers and grape growers to suit local conditions, and each clone has different attributes: flavour, acidity, tannins, ripening time. Pinot Noir is a variety which has hundreds of clones as it naturally mutates into different versions of itself; this reproduction is taken further by deliberately crossing different clones together to produce versions of the grape which have specific characteristics.

These clones produced through human interference have also naturally been developed over the centuries and some of the most famous grape varieties are crossings of other varieties. The reason vines grow grapes is to attract birds to eat them and spread the seeds elsewhere to propagate more vines. As these seeds are spread, they meet and reproduce with seeds from other varieties of grapes, which is why the exhaustive Wine Grapes book lists over 1,300 different grape varieties.

Bordeaux grapes

One of the most famous natural crossings is Cabernet Sauvignon. Originating from Bordeaux, its parents are two other grapes native to the region, Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc. Given the shared name, it seems obvious that these two grapes together produced Cabernet Sauvignon but its distinct character confused people for some time - Cabernet Sauvignon has thick skins, is late ripening, and produces wines with deep blackcurrant aromas, while Cabernet Franc ripens earlier and its wines have more red fruits and Sauvignon Blanc is a white grape. However, DNA testing in the 1990s definitively proved the heritage of Cabernet Sauvignon, a heritage one can identify through the green, herbaceous aromas sometimes found in Cabernet Sauvignon and often found in both Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon Blanc.

Meanwhile, the other great Bordeaux grape, Merlot, is also a crossing, again of Cabernet Franc and an obscure, barely planted variety called Magdeleine Noire des Charentes which wasn't even given a name until the 1990s when it was found growing outside some villagers' houses.

Along with a now rarely-grown Bordeaux variety called Gros Cabernet, Cabernet Franc is also the parent grape of Carmenère, which is now mostly found in Chile. Cabernet Franc plays a vital if sometimes overlooked part in Bordeaux blends, adding colour, acidity, and aromas of red fruits and pencil shavings. As the parent grape of Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, as well as Carmenère, it's perhaps entitled to call itself the most important Bordeaux grape.

Chardonnay, Aligoté, and Gamay

Crossings have been formed from both natural and human interference. Both can be unpredictable, but it's the natural evolution which can be the most surprising yet effective. Pinot Noir is one of the most promiscuous grapes, reproducing to create Pinot Gris and Pinot Blanc. In Burgundy, the grape has mutated, either naturally or through cutting the best vines and planting them in a new vineyard, and this is one of the reasons the villages and vineyards of Burgundy produce such diverse wines.

This has not only led to it creating different versions of itself, but also completely different grape varieties. On three separate occasions, it has procreated with the same variety - Gouais Blanc, an otherwise forgettable white grape - to produce three different off-spring all now grown in Burgundy: Chardonnay, Aligoté, and Gamay. I remember being told this in a class, and a student shouted out, "But that's impossible! How can they produce such different varieties?" The instructor likened it to having children: one couple might have three children that can be hard to tell apart, another couple might have three children remarkably dissimilar, say with dark hair, fair hair, and red hair. So it was with Pinot Noir and Gouais Blanc.

Müller-Thurgau and Scheurebe

That's how nature works, now back to the humans. Riesling is one of the most difficult grapes to grow, a late-ripening variety that only produces complex wines in a cool climate and on difficult stony soils. In the late 19th century and early 20th, German scientists attempted to create crossings that replicated the complexity of Riesling, but ripened much earlier to make life easier on growers. One of the crossings created was by a Dr. Müller, who hailed from the Swiss canton of Thurgau. He thought he was crossing Riesling with another quality German variety, Silvaner, but that other variety was in actual fact Madeleine-Royal, about which there is otherwise little of interest to say. In the 1960s, Müller-Thurgau began to dominate plantings as Germany recovered from the Second World War. It was easy and cheap to grow, its rise was unstoppable, and it so badly damaged Germany's reputation as the heart of once-fashionable wines such as Blue Nun and Black Tower. Since the 1990s, there has been a concerted effort to reduce plantings, but it's still the second-most planted variety in Germany, with 11,000ha of the country's 100,000ha of vines.

Another variety that was once thought to be a Riesling-Silvaner crossing is Scheurebe, created by a Dr. Scheu (Rebe means vine in German). It has grassy, grapefruit aromas, and its high acidity makes it ideal for good-quality sweet wine. Despite its quality, there's not much planted in Germany (just over 2,000ha) as it just doesn't produce wines as classy as Riesling, but there are some dry and sweet wines made from it (try Pfeffingen's dry Scheurebe from Pfalz). In 2012, it was finally discovered what the crossing was: Riesling and a variety I have never heard of called Buckettsrebe.

other notable crossings

One of my favourite crossings is Zweigelt, a fruity, often easy-drinking, yet tannic red that a customer once admitted to me she was addicted to. It's Austria's most planted black grape, and is a crossing of the country's two highest-quality black varieties, Blaufränkisch and St-Laurent. Its name comes from Dr. Zweigelt, who crossed the grapes in 1922. Hans Igler produces an extraordinarily good value Zweigelt from Burgenland.

Another less successful crossing is Pinotage, although South Africans would dispute that claim. The wines are often full of chocolate aromas, with a weird rubberiness. Despite that, it's become South Africa's national grape as it's barely grown elsewhere. Wines are getting much better as winemakers learn to deal with the grape (check out Rijk's). It was developed by South African I. A. Perold in 1925, a random crossing of Pinot Noir and the Rhône grape Cinsault. Both of these varieties are known for their red fruit characteristics, yet Pinotage has big, bold, overripe black fruit aromas. Such is the unpredictability of crossings ....

Beaujolais

The leading figure in Beaujolais is Georges DuBoeuf, who has probably done more to attract attention to Beaujolais over the last 50 years than anyone else. He created and promoted the commercialisation of Beaujolais Nouveau, but also produces serious Cru wine. I met him once and he told me, with a chauvinism only a charming, elderly Frenchman could get away with: "Beaujolais is a woman you flirt with, maybe spend a night with, and then forget about. Burgundy is a woman you fall in love with for the rest of your life but can never afford to marry. Bordeaux is a woman you marry and then divorce." 

Having spent a weekend in Beaujolais I have to disagree with Georges: these are wines I will come back to. Probably the most underappreciated and least understood of all of France's wine regions, Beaujolais is known for simple, fruity, inexpensive wine, most notoriously in the once ubiquitous Beaujolais Nouveau. My recent trip to Beaujolais uncovered a very different side to the region: a scenic, sometimes dramatic, and isolated area sheltering hilltop villages little changed over the years. Dirt tracks lead to dusty tasting rooms and weathered winemakers shyly pouring world-class wines. Quality may vary, but when Beaujolais is good it's as distinctive and memorable as any of France's best wines - and much more affordable.

view from Chiroubles

where is it?

In its rare moments of pretension, Beaujolais calls itself "southern Burgundy" to associate itself with its more illustrious neighbour. Although administratively within Burgundy, Beaujolais couldn't be much more different. The soil is sandy and rocky, dominated by granite. There are vast plains churning out basic Beaujolais, rising to steep, high undulating hills for the quality wines. It's a beautiful region to visit, even if there is little going on: this is an area time has little touched.

Chapelle de la Madone, Fleurie, looks down on hillside vines

the grape

98% of Beaujolais is planted with Gamay, an easy to grow grape that produces fruity, immediate, purple-coloured wine. The vines are planted using the gobelet system - small, stubby vines reaching upwards into a outstretched claw. This allows dense plantings - between 9 and 13,000 vines per hectare which is some of the densest plantings in the world - to encourage high yields. Much maligned, Gamay is always fun but occasionally quite serious.

gobelet vines and granite soils

the appellations

winery inside the church at Juliénas

There are three tiers to Beaujolais. Around 50% of production is the basic Beaujolais AC, which is cheap, fruity, and forgettable. As the vineyards rise from the flat plains, the grapes qualify for Beaujolais-Villages, a significant step up in quality which accounts for 25% of production. The greatest wines come from the ten Crus, in the midst of dramatically situated vineyards. Here, the cheerful fruitiness of Gamay is accompanied by an unexpected structure, concentration, and intensity. Despite being close to each other, each Cru has a distinct profile, from tannic Moulin-à-Vent, floral Fleurie, spicy Juliénas, to ageworthy Morgon. These wines are fruity enough to be drunk young and on their own, but substantial enough to be aged and drunk with hearty, meaty dishes. 

From the 1960s until at least the 1990s, Beaujolais was known for Beaujolais Nouveau, a wine almost straight from the barrel for immediate consumption. The novelty of drinking wine that's only just been fermented created a fashion which led to it being responsible for over 60% of Beaujolais sales in the late 1980s. Unfortunately, Nouveau has dominated perceptions of Beaujolais and it's difficult to convince consumers that the region is capable of more than these simple, fruity wines. Nouveau is still big in Japan. 

the wines

I had a lot of fun tasting Beaujolais over the course of just a couple of days, sampling wines straight from the cask or drinking it with lamb, chicken, salads, and on its own. This is an extremely versatile wine, as evidenced by two informal visits to producers in the Fleurie Cru. Unlike Burgundy, wineries are open to public visits, though you might have to interpret a few wayward signposts to find what you're looking for. 

Domaine de la Madone, Fleurie
Located on the top of a steep hillside besides a small chapel, Jean-Marc Dupres makes wines solely within the Fleurie appellation. There is quite a range, including a fresh, floral, aromatic Viognier (€9; ✪✪✪✪), the only white grape planted in Fleurie. Of the traditional styles of Beaujolais, the Cuvée Speciale (€12.80; ✪✪✪✪✪) from old vines was most noteworthy: fruity, spicy, and intense. Dupres also makes a couple of wines using oak-ageing, also from old vines: the Prestige (€14.50; ✪✪✪✪✪) is aged in old oak barrels, giving it a round, smooth complexity, while the 1889 (€27; ✪✪✪✪✪), made partly from vines planted that year, sees a prolonged 25-day maceration (the norm in Beaujolais is 10-14 days), with two years in new oak, marrying the fruity profile of Gamay with cocoa, chocolate, and coffee from the oak.

Clos de la Roillette, Fleurie
At the bottom of a dirt track outside the village of Fleurie, we were hosted by winemaker Alain Coudert's shy, softly-spoken son in a cellar that probably hadn't been cleaned in several decades. Once again, the most interesting wines were from old vines, this time planted in the 1930s. The Cuvée Tardive (c.€15; ✪✪✪✪✪) was attractive, complex, and, with gripping tannins and high acidity, ageworthy. Likewise with the Griffe de Marquis, which I tasted from the 2013, 2012, and 2007 vintages. The Marque Déposée 2007 (✪✪✪✪✪✪) was a magnificent example of how Beaujolais can defy preconceptions: a gamey, meaty, animal nose, yet remarkably fresh on the palate with high acidity and a long, fresh, spicy finish.

Where else in the world can you leave a tasting room with a bottle of quality wine that you can drink later that evening or age for a few years - and for just €7.20, as we did with Clos de la Roilette's Brouilly (✪✪✪✪)? I know of no other region where such outstanding wines retail at such affordable prices.

At its best, Beaujolais is unassuming rather than simple. Too unassuming perhaps: Beaujolais needs to assert its quality more confidently to change people's perceptions of the wines. It could do with developing a proper tourist infrastructure, to help visitors explore this beautiful region - even at the cost of opening up its timeless nature to the twenty-first century. As it is, enjoy it while it's still vastly underappreciated.