PEI Liquor - Celebrate Holiday eFlyer 2019

BEAUJOLAIS NOUVEAU

It’s Beaujolais Nouveau Time!

fruity quality of the grapes without extracting bitter tannins. The wine is bottled after 6 to 8 weeks, and then released to the world! The resulting wine is fresh, fruity, and low in tannins. Beaujolais Nouveau owes its easy drinkability to this special fermentation technique and to the Gamay grape which can be vinified into a very straightforward wine, but can also yield more complex and ageable wines such as those of the 10 crus of the Beaujolais at the top of the quality pyramid of the region. Beaujolais Nouveau is an extremely easy- to-drink red wine with high acidity and low tannins. It has a purply-pink hue and extremely fruity aromas of banana, strawberry and sometimes even bubblegum. Take a sip, and you’ll notice red berry flavours including raspberry, red cherry, red currant, and cranberries. A Beaujolais Nouveau will be silky smooth and medium-bodied with vibrant acidity. This is a wine intended for drinking immediately and is best served slightly chilled to bring the fruit flavours forward (30 minutes in the fridge is just about perfect). The classic pairing with Beaujolais Nouveau is some traditional French-style charcuterie and cheeses like Jambon de Bayonne or prosciutto, dry-cured sausages, light pâtés, and mild soft cheeses like brie, camembert or Muenster. It’s also a popular pairing with Thanksgiving or Christmas dinners due to its’ annual arrival date close to the holidays, its’ food-friendly nature and of course the celebratory nature of its release.

As the clock strikes midnight on the third Thursday of November, the new vintage of Beaujolais Nouveau will be released to the world. The much anticipated wine is released just weeks after the years’ grapes have been harvested. This special wine is from the Beaujolais wine region in eastern France located north of Lyon, where the wine originated about a century ago as a Festive drink produced by locals to celebrate the end of the harvest season. Today, there are dozens of vintners making this popular red; the Beaujolais region is home to about 4,000 vineyards which produce over 35 million bottles of Beaujolais Nouveau per year. Over the years, the hype and tradition surrounding the years’ new vintage have made the annual release of this much-loved wine a fun-filled and much anticipated event. Around the world, wine lovers wait for their first chance to taste it and to stock up on limited quantities. Once it’s gone, the world has to wait for another year, and each growing season brings distinct flavours and qualities to the wine. Not only is Beaujolais Nouveau great wine on its own merit, it’s also seen as an early indicator of the quality of the vintage. Beaujolais Nouveau starts with the hand-picking of Gamay grapes. The grapes are then loaded into large sealed tanks where they undergo a whole-berry fermentation starting out with uncrushed grapes. This technique preserves the fresh,

22 CELEBRATE HOLIDAY 2019

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