La Pépière 2008 Muscadet Sèvre & Maine Sur Lie Les Gras Moutons “Cuvée Eden” (Loire) – Perhaps not the ideal time to be drinking this, as its bones and acids are showing without a whole lot of the flesh that was there at release. Finishes very long and with growing intensity, so there’s definitely promise. (8/11)
Browse Tag
muscadet sèvre and maine
Lie Atwater
Ollivier “Domaine de la Pépière” 2008 Muscadet Sèvre & Maine “Sur Lie” (Loire) – As shelled a wine as I’ve ever tasted from Ollivier, and I’ve tasted a lot of mollusks from this producer. Straightforward, and yet it dances a bit with food, changing the step when one least expects it. Undemanding, perhaps, but not at all uninteresting. (10/10)
Old currency
Bossard “Domaine de l’Ecu” 2003 Muscadet Sèvre & Maine “Sur Lie” “Expression de Gneiss” (Loire) – Thick for a Muscadet (no real surprise there), but in that thickness is a powerful, insistent minerality that has also been concentrated beyond Muscadet’s wont. Dry, then sweet, then dry again…likely, in all cases, a mere illusion of density. One could do a lot worse from mostly-oppressive French 2003s than this bottle. (9/10)
Couldn’t work a "toi" in there?
Rousseau “Domaine des Trois Toits” 2007 Muscadet Sèvre & Maine Sur Lie (Loire) – Basic modern Muscadet, by which I mean not suffering from the dentally painful underripeness of the cheap commercial quaffing crap, but clean seaside transparency with the suggestion of fruit weight but the unlikelihood of ever identifying that fruit. For washing down bivalves, I’ll take it and enjoy myself. But it’s not Muscadet for contemplation. (8/10)
Home on the Grange
Luneau-Papin “Domaine Pierre de La Grange” 2004 Muscadet Sèvre & Maine Sur Lie “Vieilles Vignes” (Loire) – Not as together as it once was, though I don’t know if this indicates closure or deconstruction. Shells under rocks, rocks under shells, rounded-off and a little dull, yet with cracks and erosion showing. Hold longer, or drink last year? Dunno. I can’t imagine it would be falling apart already, though. (7/10)
Let’s go
Luneau-Papin 1997 Muscadet Sèvre & Maine Sur Lie Clos des Allées “Vieilles Vignes” (Loire) – Brittle shells and a memory of generosities long passed. Not the best vintage to have aged this long, but it’s fine enough, and it’s worth nothing that there’s more heft and fullness after about six hours of room-temperature aeration, bringing in shiny metals and draped, desiccated fruit skins. Maybe the first sip underrates? Well, this is my last bottle, so I’ll never know more than what I’ve just written. (7/10)
Paint it black
Métaireau 1997 Muscadet Sèvre & Maine Sur Lie “carte noire” (Loire) – Corked. (7/10)
Sált & Pépière
Ollivier “Domaine de la Pépière” 2008 Muscadet Sèvre & Maine “Sur Lie” (Loire) – Precise, shelled, and saline. Very mild, though. (5/10)
Salt & Pèpière
Ollivier “Domaine de la Pépière” 2008 Muscadet Sèvre & Maine “Sur Lie” (Loire) – Ripe shells, rounded bones. The dryness here is a fulsome dryness, and that makes all the difference in a wine that can, at times, be spare in the tune of void. I like this for drinking now, though I’m sure there’s no real hurry either. Classic Muscadet as it should be, rather than is, and the price is absurdly low for the quality. (3/10)
Pépière steak
Ollivier “Domaine de la Pépière” 2008 Muscadet Sèvre & Maine “Sur Lie” (Loire) – Bony and spare, but with the early-maturing elegance of developed minerality. Look, this is not a wine everyone, or even most, will “get.” I’m not even sure I do, all the time. In a way, that makes it even better than it is. (3/10)