Loire 2009 First Taste: The Nantais & Anjou
Warm weather makes for a great vintage, right? Well, as far as the Loire is concerned, and for many other regions and countries too I suspect, that is at least partly true. It is difficult to make great wines in cool and wet vintages, whereas warm weather at least brings the hope of something exceptional, especially (in the Loire, particularly) when that weather encompasses harvest-time, allowing dry and healthy fruit to be brought in.
There is much more to great wine than mere temperatures and sunshine, though; after all, if heat were all that were required, the world’s great wines would all originate from Mexico, Central African nations and the Australian outback. This is especially true when we look at the disconnect between technical and physiological ripeness that can result from warmer temperatures. The first, technical ripeness, relates to the rising sugar and falling acid concentrations as the fruit ripens on the vine, as I have already described in my account of Touraine IM/Cab37 indices in my Loire 2009 vintage review. Under warmer conditions these sugar-acid changes occur earlier, but the point of physiological ripeness, the development of the tannins in skin, pip and stalk, moves less readily it seems.
So warmer weather might bring sweeter fruit, but as a consequence of holding out for the more reticent physiological ripeness there might be lower acidity as a result, or too high a level of sugar. The loss of the former can be very detracting for a style such as Muscadet or Sancerre, where the fresh cut of the acid is really part of the appeal. And in reds, higher levels of sugar threatens higher alcohol levels. What is gained in terms of concentration might be lost in terms of balance, freshness or elegance. Approaching a vintage such as 2009 thus requires a degree of conservatism; everything will not necessarily be rosy and wonderful.
