Wine Sediments

For my first post on Wine Sediments, I thought I’d take a little different take on a big subject this week - the 2006 Beaujolais Nouveau!  Instead of writing about how wonderful it is that it’s coming out today (it is a great thing!), here’s how I first got interested in even trying this fun-to-drink wine:

Honestly, I can’t remember the year (I’d guess 1990), but David Letterman was still on NBC.  Tony Randall was a frequent guest on the show, and the chemistry was pretty good between the two of them.

This particular time, Tony Randall was on to talk about the fact that the AOC had hired him as the spokesperson for that year’s Beaujolais Nouveau release.  The show was on a few days before the third Thursday of November, so the wine hadn’t officially been released, but he had a couple of bottles with him.  If you know of Tony Randall, you can imagine how pompous he sounded talking about the wine, when Letterman grabs a bottle and opens it.  Tony Randall went nuts!  He couldn’t believe that Letterman had opened the wine ‘early’… And then Letterman proceeded to pour it, drink it, spit it out, and say, “This tastes like piss!”

Seeing Tony Randall’s reaction had me laughing until I cried.  I was still in my 20’s, and I’d never had a taste of Beaujolais Nouveau, but that Thursday, I had to stop and get my first bottle at a local wine shop.  I’ve always favored big red wines… This was a different thing altogether, but still very enjoyable.

Since then, I’ve found that Beaujolais Nouveau makes a great wine for Thanksgiving, as it goes well with turkey, kind if mimicking the tartness of cranberries, and it’s easy to drink and inexpensive.  I also find that it’s a really good wine to have my non-winedrinking or non-red-winedrinking friends try as something different.  And every time I open a new bottle, I remember that episode of Late Night and still kind of chuckle to myself.