Hotdogsbeerandpeanuts?
Like many couples, we speak in code. Whole thoughts collapse into a single word. When one of us asks the other “hot dogs, beer and peanuts?” what we mean is “Hey, there’s a special Mets game on tonight, so why don’t we have hot dogs, beer and peanuts while we watch?”
We go to three or four Mets games a year, but it’s much easier and cheaper to pretend we’re at Citi Field. Sometimes, when we’re home, Dottie will make wings or ribs. But hotdogsbeerandpeanuts is the classic. We don’t know very much about beer – the craft movement exploded while we were busy studying and writing about wine – but we enjoy it and, heaven knows, a six-pack from Trader Joe’s is a far better deal than a Coors Light at the stadium.
And so it was that, for the first game after the All-Star Break, John turned to Dottie and said “hotdogsbeerandpeanuts?” We were all in, but then we realized that we really didn’t feel like beer. We were in a wine mood. We discussed this for some time. What wine could pair with hot dogs? (As with any food pairing, the preparation matters, of course. Dottie pan-fries the all-beef franks. John has them with mustard and a dash of relish. Dottie also has ketchup and, yes, she knows this is very, very wrong. In 1996, servers at the Democratic Convention in Chicago gave her the side eye and shook their heads after hearing her preferred condiments. And one of our daughters has mortuusequeesphobia.)
With the wine, it wouldn’t just be the tastes that would have to work with the hot dogs. The whole sense of the wine would need to be ballpark-appropriate. For example, a heavy red would be all wrong, as would a big white. We could see a bone-dry Riesling, since it could be easy to drink and all-American hot dogs are, after all, sausages, in their way. We recently wrote about Best’s Western dry Riesling from Australia and liked it so much that we bought several bottles, so that’s definitely a possibility down the road. But, at the moment, both of us had the same thought: We’d really like to drink some Beaujolais to celebrate the beginning of the rest of the season. We don’t need much reason to open a bottle of Beaujolais, truth be told, but we don’t have it often enough and, as far as we can recall, we never had Beaujolais with hot dogs. And good Beaujolais goes with everything, right?
Beaujolais is one of the wonders the wine world. Made from Gamay, there are various quality levels, from plain Beaujolais to the special villages or crus, like Moulin-à-Vent. It’s also good at various temperatures. In fact, we just had dinner at the very cool Manhattan bistro Café Luxembourg, where they offer two Beaujolais and on the wine list say: “available chilled.” We had Château du Bois de la Salle Juliénas 2022, chilled ($70). It was lovely.
To us, Beaujolais generally is better when it’s young, but the best examples can age for a few years. It’s widely available and often reasonably priced. Our only major caveat is that we sometimes see a few woebegone older bottles sitting on shelves of bad wine shops and when youthful charm and life is wrung out of Beaujolais on the shelf, that’s a shame. And while Nouveau is always a good excuse for a party when it is released in November, the World Series, sadly, ends weeks earlier.
We’re not the only ones who believe wine deserves a place at a baseball stadium. The San Francisco Giants in 2022 hired Master Sommelier Evan Goldstein to help raise the level of its existing wine service at Oracle Park. (The Giants have had wine at its games since Opening Day in 1997 at Candlestick Park, when wine was first allowed at stadiums.) We asked Goldstein, a longtime Giants fan and a friend, what he thought of a hot dog-Beaujolais pairing and he wrote:
“Well, the ‘pick’ of wine for a hot depends on the dog (hot link? Sheboygan? Polish??) and your choice of condiments—but presuming the ask is for the good old all-beef frank, I am a fan of brown mustard, chopped onions, a little sauerkraut and pairing it with bright youthful Zinfandel—that’s the all-American match, no? That said, what is another wine, maybe with a kiss less alcohol and a modicum less oak, that would also pair well—indeed, a Beaujolais. While a Cru may be a little overkill in price, a tasty and enjoyable Beaujolais or Beaujolais Villages would be super and a more than worthy stunt double for that all-American match above! We currently do not have any Beaujolais (or indeed Gamay) on our lists at Oracle right now but offer a few Zins, several Pinot Noirs, a quaffable Argentine Malbec (not oaky at all), a few Syrahs, and other reds that will complement most any sausage! In the end, we have different wine offerings at our wine bars, the suites, our Gotham Club, Cloud Club, and Audi Club but promise there are good hot dog matches to be found at all of them!”
We decided to do a blind tasting and quickly bought 10 bottles of Beaujolais. We didn’t choose them; we just picked up the first 10 we saw. They averaged $21.30 per bottle. The most expensive was $27.97 and the least expensive was $10.97. We conducted the tasting over two nights, with the wines in brown bags. Here are our favorites in descending order:
4) Bruno Copéret “Roche-Guillon” Beaujolais-Villages 2022 ($18.99). We were impressed with this as soon as we popped the cork because minerals and fruit jumped from the bottle. Yes, it had lively Beaujolais tastes, but a surprisingly deep minerality that made it more complex and more complete than many Beaujolais. We had never seen this producer before and found this at a so-so local store. We’re glad we did.
3) Château de La Chaize Brouilly 2022 ($27.97). We have loved this wine for so long that we remember drinking it in the 1970s with prime rib and mushrooms in a restaurant called The Depot in Miami that was an actual retired railroad car. It’s drinkable and fun. The forward fruit paired very well with the slightly charred crunch of the hot dogs.
2) Domaine Dupeuble Pere et Fils 2023 Beaujolais ($21.97). We first wrote about this wine in 2005 and have looked for it ever since. It combines easy drinking and a long, fruity finish with a pleasant tannic structure, giving it length that makes it a welcoming partner with a variety of foods, like hot dogs.
1) Louis Jadot Beaujolais-Villages 2023 ($12.97). Our notes: “Jazzy, exciting color. Fruity nose. Peppery, with some jamminess and a nice acidic finish. Super-balanced. Classy wine, good with everything and at various temps. Nice tartness.” It’s hard to imagine that any fine wine could stand up to hot dogs, but this did. It made the ballpark meal even more fun and livelier. And look at that price! This has been a favorite for a very long time and it is widely available. By the way, we also had the Louis Jadot Beaujolais (not Villages) as part of the tasting ($10.97) and did not like it as much.
We’re headed to Citi Field in the next couple of weeks for a game. Maybe instead of our Mets jerseys we’ll wear Beaujolais T-shirts and then try to hide from the Coldplay Kiss-Cam. Hey, youneverknow.
Dorothy J. Gaiter and John Brecher conceived and wrote The Wall Street Journal’s wine column, “Tastings,” from 1998 to 2010. Dorothy and John have been tasting and studying wine since 1973. In 2020, the University of California at Davis added their papers to the Warren Winiarski Wine Writers Collection in its library, which also includes the work of Hugh Johnson and Jancis Robinson. Dottie has had a distinguished career in journalism as a reporter, editor, columnist and editorial writer at The Miami Herald, The New York Times, and at The Journal. John was Page One Editor of The Journal, City Editor of The Miami Herald and a senior editor at Bloomberg News. They are well-known from their books and many television appearances, especially on Martha Stewart’s show, and as the creators of the annual, international “Open That Bottle Night” celebration of wine and friendship. The first bottle they shared was André Cold Duck. They have two daughters.
