You get what you pay for has been my idea of buyuing wine - the price an indicator of the goodness. Now wine aficionados will recoil at this philosophy and no doubt for good reason:
To wit the George Duboeuf scandal talked about in the NYTimes today - Agence France Presse (assumably much more reliable that L'Equipe!) says that 300,000 bottles of expensive vintage Beaujolais from 2004 had been adulterated with low-grade wine. Duboeuf supplies 75% of Beaujolais exported abroad. And sometimes you don't get what you pay for!

Thinking Beaujolais is a great wine
means that you don't know wine...
It's more than 25 years I've not had a
glass of Beaujolais : a "good small wine" for a student dinner and not certainly a real good wine...
And Duboeuf is certainly more a "merchant" than a winemaker...
The only "good" beaujolais wines are the one with "names" : moulin à vent, brouilly, saint-amour,...but keep you far from beaujolais and beaujolais village : there are only "assemblages" of wines with a taste which changes every year in the mood...
And l'Equipe is certainly more serious that NYT or AFP(they had never had an editorial scandal like the one of this year..).
Erik.

Huh? Isn't George Duboeuf Beaujolais, that stuff they stack up in the corner at my supermarket for $5.99 a bottle? I'd say you will get what you pay for.

What does "expensive vintage Beaujolais" mean? Isn't that stuff meant to be drunk within months (or is it hours?) of production?

Patrick- I think you're thinking of Beaujolais <i>nouveau</i> that has to be quaffed so quickly.

However, it's my understanding too that beaujolais in general is not (a) expensive or (b) vintage (ages well).

Good comments - but i don't think i said 'Beaujolais was a great wine' - i've heard the gist of what you said and especially that ballyhooed Beaujolais Nouveau was mainly a genious marketing stroke aimed at foreign markets - air has gone out of the balloon i guess. But i do like Beaujolais - even the cheaper (3-5 euro) ones i buy at Carrefour! Not great wine but unique taste to me. Before you lambaste me for buying such swill - i'm a fairly poor person so that's the most i can afford - i wish i could buy truly 'great' wines, but that doesn't mean i can't enjoy wine! Prost!

I think you can find some small greta wines much better than Beaujolais and even in supermarket :

some Loire's red are much better than Beaujolais and in the c&ocirc;te du Rh&ocirc;ne family the Saint Joseph are also good...and I'm sure you can find it much less expensive than Beaujolais...

Try also the Mondeuse of Savoie and the Reds of Jura which can be kept for years are to be known...

And don't forget : to be drunk with moderation...
Erik

I don't think we are lambasting you for buying cheap wine, and if you like it by all means drink it. But your original post DID say you &quot;get what you pay for&quot; making it sound like you were talking about expensive wines. And you also said &quot;expensive vintage Beaujolais&quot;. I don't think we were misinterpreting what you were posting.

I have sat and sipped newly released Beaujolais from a pitcher in Lyon -- a much touted pasttime. To me it was like drinking watered down kool-aid.

In all due respect i simply quoting the NYTimes article - they said 'expensive vintage' referring to Duboeuf's Beaujolais. My preface explained my philsophy of getting what you pay for - yes, me a vino idiot as to truly 'great' should have been followed by the statement that when it comes to great wines i don't know diddly. I admit that - that's why i haplessly use price as an indicator. Semantics are fun and you have a point -mea culpa (sp?). Touche again.

Here's the address of the NYT article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/26/in...nce-brief.html

I like beaujolais in its many forms and see no reason to apologize. It's a fun wine and not to be enjoyed by the pretentious. I also like pinot noirs from South Africa, malbecs from Argentina, carmeneres from Chile, muscadets from the Loire, vino verde from Portugal and pic poule de pinets from France. Oh, cavas from Spain.

This past Monday, my wife and I were at Yankee Spirits in Sturbridge. MA and bought 2 bottles of seven different wines on sale, none more than $8.99 and, horrors, one at $5.99. If we're fortunate, we'll find one to make the next house wine.

Patrick, I didn't realize you traveled so out of season to be drinking the nouveau in Lyon. It isn't released until the 3rd Friday in November.

Like it or not, the release day is a big deal in France and many restaurants have special menus for the celebration.

In the article Mr Duboeuf blames the 'mistake' on a now departed flunky and that 'only 5% of production' was affected. The faux vintage wine was found out in a 'routine inspection'. Jsmith: bravo - if it tastes good to you it's a great wine!

Maybe I shouldn't have said &quot;newly released&quot;. Obviously it wasn't. But it was Beaujolais Nouveau by the pitcher in Lyon in May.

Patreek: semantics - how can it be nouveau in May? Sounds like Oldveau to me.

So what's the stuff in bottles that's called Beaujolais Nouveau? Do they throw it out after the first day?

They bottle 65 MILLION bottles of Beaujolais Nouveau annually. I doubt that every drop is drunk on that first night.

Interesting article if you want to know more about it:

http://www.intowine.com/beaujolais2.html

Give me a synopsis of the article: when does nouveau become oldveau - a bottle marked nouveau five years from now would seem to be oldveau - 7 months i'd say you were drinking oldveau nouveau. Nouveau when bottled, but i thought the idea of rushing it around the world was that it was best when drunk nouveau, very nouveau. But what the heck do i know about wine? I need to know all i want - if it tastes good, it's good!

No, Patrick, they don't throw out the Beaujolais Nouveau after the first night. It is obviously saved to sell to the unsuspecting visitor in Lyon in May.

OK. Now you're mixing up terms.

Beaulolais Nouveau is wine that is bottled between the harvest and the spring, rather than aged longer. So once it's bottled it remains a nouveau. If you drink it ten years later it would still be Beaujolais Nouvea. (But I doubt that it would be very good).

Beaujolais Nouveau is bottled by the millions of bottles to sell over a period of a year or more. I assume it is also distributed in kegs or other containers to French bars and restaurants. The big celebration in November is because that is by law the FIRST day it is allowed to be sold and drunk.

People in Lyon drink Beaujolais Nouveau all year long. Of course, the excitement is to drink the first of the new vintage on that date in November, but that doesn't mean that most bars and restaurants don't continue to sell the current year's nouveau throughout the year. And locals drink it as well as unsuspecting tourists.

Beaujolais Nouveau is even lighter than regular beaujolais because it has not aged long before being bottled. In the article cited above, I love the expression that Beaujolais Nouveau is a red wine that is as close to a white wine as you can get.

Once upon a time, the Patron offered the peasants a barrel or so of the new wine from the harvest.

If they drank enough of it, they forgot how poorly they were treated all year long.

The idea of selling Beaujolais Nouveau commercially is similar to the &quot;Get the employees' price&quot; that the automobile people are touting this year.