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| One chestnut of the wine trade is that to everything there is a season, that there is a wine for every occasion, and that Champagne pairs with everything. I am a literal-minded person, but one with 20 percent more irony and so my internal voice silently intones when I hear this warmed-over chestnut repeated like a self-evident mantra, “oh really, what do you recommend for a bout of fist-shaking road rage fueled by serotonin syndrome, or a visit to your gastroenterologist, or a PTA meeting when your daughter’s 3rd-grade teacher’s breath smells of stale coffee and gin as she describes your kid as incorrigible when you know that she is merely bored out of her mind, or the funeral of a close friend when all you can think about is how ill-fitting this one-time beautiful suit now is, but how your dearly departed now couldn’t care less?” And Champagne, a wine that I do enjoy but do not find to be a cure for any and every occasion and any and everything that you might put in your mouth, e.g., there is no Champagne that I ever want to drink with Neapolitan ice cream. And yet, good Beaujolais is the sort of wine that I do want to put in my mouth most days of the year, without feeling the need to supplement it in any way—things do seem to go better with Beaujolais, to riff on the old Neil Diamond-penned jingle, “things go better with Coke!” And yet, good Beaujolais seems to remain a bit of a secret, even in France, where drinkers with fine sensibilities express disdain for it, tainted perhaps by the annual spectacle of their fellow citizens behaving badly while guzzling liters of crass, commercial, crappy Beaujolais nouveau, or perhaps the dying vestiges of cultural class warfare, which views Beaujolais consumption under the sign of the peasant, for it is truly the consummate peasant’s wine, and what is your problem with that? This afternoon we are tasting some particularly good Beaujolais. We are starting with a simple yet charming wine that carries merely the Beaujolais appellation, and conclude with three wines from the northern part of the appellation, including one from OG natural winemaker, Guy Breton. The wines from the northern part of Beaujolais wines carry not the Beaujolais name but the name of their cru, or growing area, each of which has a distinctive character.
Michel Guignier Beaujolais 2018 |