2018 Louis Jadot Beaujolais-Villages

2018 Louis Jadot Beaujolais-Villages

Vintage: 2018

Region: Beaujolais, France (Beaujolais-Villages AOC) 

Winemakers: Louis Jadot

Varietal: Gamay

Price: $10

Expert Rating: 89

My Rating: 86

The Review: Beaujolais! Is it Burgundy? Is it its own region? Who knows! (if you're already curious this soon into reading the post, I'll answer- it's legally classified as Burgundy, but because they don't grow the same grapes as Burgundy, it's technically its own wine region. You'll soon notice a common theme of France being dumb.) Aside from being fun to say, this is probably one of the more well-known wine regions of the world (especially amongst Millenials and older). However, it's not famous these days for spectacular wines- quite the opposite in fact. It's famous because in the 80's, a wine known as Beaujolais Nouveau exploded in popularity in the US. Beaujolais Nouveau is bottled immediately after fermentation and is traditionally drank exclusively in the region to celebrate the end of harvest. However, when some hip Americans discovered it, they brought it back and it became trendy. Then like all trendy things, it sucked (producers were putting out crap products to meet demands and because the people will sell Americans anything). SO in a sentence long summary- Beaujolais is not the same as Beaujolais Nouveau.

In recent years, good Beaujolais, always made from the Gamay grape, has started to make a comeback. The wine is often described as being an even lighter Pinot Noir (cue Burgundy feud), and I like to refer to it as a "red white." In fact, if you tell me "I don't like reds," you will likely be drinking a bottle of this when you next see me (Paige, you're next). In my humble opinion, this is easily the most approachable red on the planet. 

Today's wine from world-famous French producer Maison Louis Jadot is their 2018 Beaujolais-Villages. This is an interesting Beaujolais to start out with because it actually has notably more body than usual. Alas... here we go.

The nose is incredibly fruity and jammy- lots of notes of strawberry jam, ripe plum, and some blueberry in there too. There's the faintest hint of pepper that sneaks in behind the fruit. On the taste, a nice punch of acidity delivers fruit, fruit, and more fruit- tart cherry, raspberry, undertones of strawberry jam. The fruit evolves into a mild peppery and herbaceous medium-length finish. As I mentioned, the body of this wine was fuller than a normal Beaujolais and presented slightly more than light tannins (still really not very firm at all). The tannin honestly does more for texture than for anything else.

As you may have noticed, a lot of these notes could be used to describe Pinot Noir too, hence Beaujolais being a "turned down to level 5" Pinot Noir. I truly do hope you give this style a shot, even if you traditionally don't like reds. I think you'll find it to be really interesting and inviting- a gateway of sorts into reds. Oh, and drink it chilled like a white too. Let me know what you think.

drink what you like,

db