Beaujolais News
Photos courtesy of Georges Duboeuf.
As a longtime member of the Georges Duboeuf team, I’ve seen a lot of vintages come and go over the course of my career. Each one has its own story, its own qualities and sometimes, its own challenges. Even so, the 2016 vintage for the Beaujolais and Beaujolais Villages appellations (which we’ve been tasting since they were first pressed) are simply incredible.
This year, we started selecting and buying our wines from our winemakers and cooperatives back on the 10th of October. Then we crafted our individual cuvées according to our various markets and clients. We began bottling on the 12th of October.
Gamay grapes. Photo courtesy of Georges Duboeuf.
During this process, we were deeply impressed by the quality of this vintage. It turned out to be much rounder, more generous and more flavorful than we ever expected. Little by little, we fell in love with the finesse of the tannins, the persistent finish and beautiful fruit notes. These are all the qualities of a remarkable young wine.
Recently, we tasted each of our bottled Beaujolais, except for a few smaller bottling runs which we’ll taste at the beginning of next week. The aroma profile for all was rich with notes of black cherry, ripe, slightly crushed strawberries, a little red currant, violet, and most importantly, a consistent body and roundness. Truly beautiful, in all respects.
This vintage is astonishing, and it only continues to develop remarkably. It just goes to show that wine never stays still. It is always evolving. I’m sure that 2016 will have a few more surprises in store.
In any case, these first tastes of our young Beaujolais and Beaujolais Nouveau have been excellent, and are more than a match for the fabulous wines of 2015. One piece of advice, though: don’t chill your Beaujolais Nouveau. Serve it at room temperature, from 15°C to 18°C (or 60°F to 64°F) in order to allow the wine to fully express its character.
The 2016 Beaujolais harvest. Photo courtesy of Georges Duboeuf.
The 2016 vintage offers a pleasurable, festive wine that has the character and personality you want in a Beaujolais Nouveau. It is a joyful, pleasant wine with a full, round body, which will help it develop beautifully and keep well over time.
As always, we have poured all of our energy into crafting this year’s Beaujolais Nouveau and Beaujolais Villages Nouveau, and this year more than ever our tireless efforts have paid off.
I’d like to thank everyone who had a hand in the production and blending of our first Beaujolais and Beaujolais Villages wines in 2016.
The wine line up! Photo courtesy of Georges Duboeuf.
In the wine business, and particularly when selecting Beaujolais Nouveaux, it is crucial to seek out the finest possible wines from our producers. For the 2016 vintage, we tasted a total of 2,450 samples ( starting from the 19th of September through the end of harvest). It is this attention to detail and drive that propels us in the pursuit of excellence.
Once the tasting process is complete, we buy the wines that we think will work best in our blends. Then we collect them and work on the composition of each of the wines we produce, keeping in mind the final clients in France or abroad. This is a painstaking task, requiring true expertise, and this year has been even more complex than in previous years.
Despite this long and rigorous process, we are extremely happy and completely satisfied with the 2016 vintage.
We hope that you, your friends and loved ones will love these wines as much as we do.
From Beaujolais with love.
Georges Duboeuf, November 10th 2016
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