Hey friends and welcome to episode number 5 of The Wine CEO Podcast. I’m so excited to be launching my podcast right before the holidays as I think a lot of folks struggle with buying wine for gifts as well as wines to pair with their holiday meals. And next week is Thanksgiving and I'm sure many of you are probably doing some menu planning!
There’s 1 main wine that I like to recommend with thanksgiving, because it’s a perfect holiday food pairing - AND it’s released around thanksgiving every year. It’s called Beaujolais Nouveau and it's a red wine made from the grape varietal, gamay.
THIS Beaujolais Nouveau maker is one of my favorites and you can find it at most grocery stores and wine markets around this time of year!
With a few minor exceptions, it’s really only grown in France and is commonly found in both Burgundy and the Loire -which are both French wine regions. We call this wine Beaujolais Nouveau because it’s made in Beaujolais, which is a wine region within Burgundy, France. I’ve included a link HERE to a map so you can see where Beaujolais is located.
And what makes Beaujolais Nouveau so unique is that it's the first wine to be released for the year. All across the world, it is the first - no one else beats it. When you buy it, it is only 7 or 8 weeks old! It is harvested quickly, blended, bottled and shipped all over the world to be released traditionally on the 3rd Thursday of November.
And because of the quick production process, the wine doesn’t have the same structure that most wines get, which means that it only lasts about 3 months before it will go bad! So it’s definitely meant to drink immediately upon purchase!
Now there are 2 things that make Beaujolais Nouveau so great.
- It’s considered celebratory in the wine industry because it means the harvest has ended. Harvest is a busy and tiring time for many viticulturists, or wine growers, so the end of harvest is time to rest and be thankful for the plentiful harvest.
- And the second thing that makes beaujolais nouveau so amazing is its unique flavor. Because it is so fresh and isn’t aged, it has really unique fruity flavors that are unlike any other wine on the market. It's so light and easy to drink that it’s actually been a tradition for decades to allow kids in France to drink it!
And these fresh fruity flavors don’t just come from the wine being young. Producers of Beaujolais wines (both nouveau and standard) actually use a unique process called carbonic maceration during fermentation. In this process, the vintner or wine maker, takes whole grape clusters and tosses them into stainless steel vats and they keep piling more and more clusters of grapes until the tank is almost full.
The weight of the grapes on the top start to naturally crush the grapes at the bottom of the vat. Next, natural yeast that is on the grape skins will start to ferment the juice at the bottom of the tank.
Now when yeast eats sugar, you get alcohol, but there are actually 2 other biproducts from this chemical reaction - heat and co2. The natural carbon dioxide gas that is released, rises to the top of the tank, but because it can’t escape, it continues to collect above the grapes and it builds pressure in the tank. The pressure pushes the grapes further down in the tank, and causes the grapes to burst open and release more juice. This juice begins fermenting when it comes in contact with the juice at the bottom of the tank that has already been fermenting and this process continues until all of the grapes have been crushed and all of the juice is fermented. Then the winemaker opens the vat to release the co2 - otherwise you would have sparkling wine, which we’ll talk about in future episodes. And that’s it!
They strain the skins, seeds, and other matter out of the juice, process it to kill the yeasts, bottle it up, and ship it all over the world to be sold before the end of the year!
So because of this unique process, this wine has some equally unique flavors! A lot of sommeliers say that this wine reminds them of banana and bubble gum flavors, which are uncommon in most other wines and are distinctly from the carbonic maceration process.
So why is this such a great wine for Thanksgiving and the holidays? Well first off, the story is awesome. Few people in the U.S. have ever heard of Beaujolais Nouveau, so you can wow all of your friends and family by explaining that this wine is the first fruits of the harvest and the first wines to be released this year.
But beyond the cool story, as a really light red wine, you will be able to please both red wine and white wine drinkers with this style of wine (which makes it a crowd pleaser for sure!). Gamay is very similar to Pinot Noir, which if you remember from our last episode, is VERY light bodied and fruit forward. It goes really well with baked chicken and lighter dishes, which is exactly what turkey is! In addition, the fruitiness makes it pair perfectly with cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, green beans, and so many other holiday favorite side dishes! So this is my personal recommendation for the perfect Thanksgiving day wine to impress your family and friends.
If you can’t find Beaujolais Nouveau, you can try a standard Beaujolais, or a nice Pinot Noir from Northern California or Oregon would also make great Thanksgiving Day wines. And for all of these wines, you want to drink them slightly chilled, so be sure to pop them in the fridge for about 30 minutes before you open it.
I hope this episode was helpful for you! If you liked what you learned, please write a review on Apple Podcast, Spotify, or Amazon music - wherever you are listening! This is one of the best ways for new listeners to find my show, so I would so appreciate if you could just drop a quick note to tell me what you’re loving so far!
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