Who Put Jolly Ranchers in This Wine?

 

November 19th is Beaujolais Noveau Release Day! Beaujolais Noveau is a young red wine that has distinct aromas—often reminiscent of strawberry, cranberry, raspberry, bubblegum, violets, banana, fruit drops, and even Jolly Rancher candy! Relatively inexpensive, this French wine from the region of Beaujolais is made from the Gamay grape, quickly fermented and released for sale a quick six weeks after harvest. These fruity wines are better off chilled and not cellared for long–most are intended to be drunk by the following May.

These extremely young wines are marketed in this fashion for the cash flow benefit of the producers. So while they are “fruity fun” and are eagerly awaited by many, you won’t find your local wine aficionado lining up to be the first to grab these off the shelf when they are released for sale on November 19th. What every level of wine drinker can appreciate, however, is the way these wines are made (carbonic maceration), which imparts such interesting aromatics to the wine.

Every wine needs yeast to turn the sugars in the grape into alcohol. Typically the grapes are crushed to release the juice for fermentation. In carbonic maceration however, the entire grape cluster is placed into a sealed container, surrounded by carbon dioxide. This environment starts the fermentation process within each individual grape, resulting in a fruity wine that has low tannins. This process creates a drinkable wine quite quickly, but in doing so the wine ends up with less structure to stand up to longer term aging.
If you have never tried Beaujolais Noveau, the aromas alone are worth it. Just don’t expect complexity or aging potential.