Winemaker Notes
The 2023 Duboeuf Julienas Chateau des Capitans is a deep red color with a rich nose, revealing complex peach, cinnamon and occasionally blackcurrantaromas. On the palate, this Juliénas offers a very good structure that should allow it to age with great elegance.
Blend: 100% Gamay
Professional Ratings
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Decanter
This darkly alluring Beaujolais is the fifth from among the region’s ten crus that we've welcomed to our Best In Show selection – and the first Juliénas; we've formerly applauded two Morgons, a Moulin-à-Vent and a Fleurie. It's almost an opaque purple-red in colour, brimming with the perfumed ripeness which the magnificent 2023 vintage promised in this vintage. Among the notes our judges found on the nose were blackberry, blueberry and lavender, while the palate is fruit-saturated too (damsons and cherries join the party), with soft tannins, harmoniously juicy acidity and some ripely bitter notes on the finish to bring cleansing refreshment. Juliénas is considered one of the more muscular and powerful of the crus, and this wine lives up to that reputation – though without ever toppling over into crassness or excess.
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James Suckling
What a beautiful Julienas. This has the mountain freshness we associate with this appellation, with an excellent structure and finely nuanced tannins. Almost no perceptible oak. So much positive energy and such a juicy, long finish! Drink or hold.
Delightfully playful, but also capable of impressive gravitas, Gamay is responsible for juicy, berry-packed wines. From Beaujolais, Gamay generally has three classes: Beaujolais Nouveau, a decidedly young, fruit-driven wine, Beaujolais Villages and Cru Beaujolais. The Villages and Crus are highly ranked grape growing communes whose wines are capable of improving with age whereas Nouveau, released two months after harvest, is intended for immediate consumption. Somm Secret—The ten different Crus have their own distinct personalities—Fleurie is delicate and floral, Côte de Brouilly is concentrated and elegant and Morgon is structured and age-worthy.
The bucolic region often identified as the southern part of Burgundy, Beaujolais actually doesn’t have a whole lot in common with the rest of the region in terms of climate, soil types and grape varieties. Beaujolais achieves its own identity with variations on style of one grape, Gamay.
Gamay was actually grown throughout all of Burgundy until 1395 when the Duke of Burgundy banished it south, making room for Pinot Noir to inhabit all of the “superior” hillsides of Burgundy proper. This was good news for Gamay as it produces a much better wine in the granitic soils of Beaujolais, compared with the limestone escarpments of the Côte d’Or.
Four styles of Beaujolais wines exist. The simplest, and one that has regrettably given the region a subpar reputation, is Beaujolais Nouveau. This is the Beaujolais wine that is made using carbonic maceration (a quick fermentation that results in sweet aromas) and is released on the third Thursday of November in the same year as harvest. It's meant to drink young and is flirty, fruity and fun. The rest of Beaujolais is where the serious wines are found. Aside from the wines simply labelled, Beaujolais, there are the Beaujolais-Villages wines, which must come from the hilly northern part of the region, and offer reasonable values with some gems among them. The superior sections are the cru vineyards coming from ten distinct communes: St-Amour, Juliénas, Chénas, Moulin-à-Vent, Fleurie, Chiroubles, Morgon, Regnié, Brouilly, and Côte de Brouilly. Any cru Beajolais will have its commune name prominent on the label.