Loire 2014 First Taste: The Nantais
In contrast to some other regions of the Loire Valley, the Muscadet region has enjoyed a couple of good vintages (speaking purely in terms of the quality of the wines) in recent years, and 2014 seems to continue this trend. This is great news after some hard times for the region. We all know Muscadet is under-rated and under-appreciated anyway (and continuously bashed by lazy wine writers for something that happened forty years ago, as I wrote in here earlier this week), but the devastating frost on April 7th, 2008, which prompted a spiralling decline in the region’s fortunes, resulting in multiple bankruptcies and abandoned vineyards, only added to the pain. And the rot of 2011 that saw nearly every wine in this vintage (but not quite all of them) tainted to some extent only piled it on.
As I have already indicated in my introduction, despite these traumas there have been some very good wines made, especially in 2010 and 2012, and to a lesser extent also 2013. Having said that, the most recent pair of vintages, 2012 and 2013, were by no means perfect. The first produced beautiful wines, but thanks to a difficult flowering yields were well down, so despite good quality the quantity was much lower than hoped for, and so the financial hardships for the vignerons continued. A variety of problems in 2013 also saw yields pushed downwards, not so severely, but again the quality of the wines was good. Happily in 2014 not only do we have excellent quality, certainly on a pair with 2010 and 2012 and perhaps exceeding what these vintages gave us, the yields are also up a little more. It is not a bountiful year, but the quantities are certainly much closer to normal.
In this, the first of my detailed regional reports, I will look at how the Muscadet region faired in 2014, and I will follow up on the second page with many tasting notes for the vintage, taking in Muscadet and its regional Sèvre et Maine and Côtes de Grandlieu appellations, as well as taking a look at the Fiefs Vendéens, Gros Plant du Pays Nantais and all the Vin de Pays (or IGP as many call them these days) wines to be found here.
