3CUPS Blog

Weekend Wine

Michel Delhommeau

Muscadet Sevre et Maine Sur Lie

2006 Cuvée Harmonie

$9.99/bottle, $107.89/case = $8.99

I thought I hated Muscadet. For my first few years inside a wine store I completely failed to see the appeal. Every Muscadet I tasted was thin, astringent, sour, either essentially fruitless or marked by a distinctly harsh and not particularly fresh character. I was mired in a sea of worthless junk Muscadet, an easy situation to get oneself into.

This is an awkward moment- because I've seen the light, tasted the real Muscadet after years of only seeing wines that provide ammo for the region's detractors. What I'm telling you about today is an awesome dry white worth getting excited about, the type of wine that was a Muscadet lifeline for me, or at least an example of why this region does not deserve to be written off.

Today we have a whole Muscadet section in the store, and I think the region deserves this front-and-center placement. We offer a pile of worthy wines from this most western wine growing area of the Loire, a group of crafted and vibrant wines that are in 2008 trading for a fraction of their essential value. Muscadet is cheap, it's a heck of a partner for in-season mussels or oysters (or NC shrimp, see below) and it is on the verge of discovery/hipness. If you believe wine can be hip. Let's face it- wine shop folks and sommeliers tend to be pretty nerdy.

So buy today. Prices will rise. The always equitable, earnest and essentially awesome importer Jon David Headrick cut us a super deal on the wine. We bought all that was left, and while cases gently stored will keep for a couple years or more I'd recommend using Muscadet as your go-to white wine for the hectic couple months ahead. 

Some salient facts:

The Place... Muscadet, although not as well known in the United States, is the largest white wine appellation of France.

The Grape... The Melon de Bourgogne grape, also called Muscadet, was brought to the region centuries ago from Burgundy.  It flourished in this new environment and became famous in France for its ability to compelment the saltiest of oysters and shellfish of the region.

The Farm... Michel and Nathalie Delhommeau farm 28 hectares of vines which exist almost entirely on rock.

"Based in the village of Monnieres, a village with a high proportion of gabbro (plutonic rock formed from molten lava), Michel and his wife Nathalie are producing the most mineral rich Muscadets I've tasted in a long time. While some other appellations can get away with high yields and still produce a quality product, it's much harder to do in Muscadet. High yields result in a highly mediocre wine with little complexity and sense of style. Michel Delhommeau "gets" this and keeps yields ridiculously low, vinifies only by soil type, and further separates out tanks by vine age. Very cool stuff. Michel Delhommeau is definitely the most exciting "find" I've had in a while. When I went to taste with him in 2006, I quickly saw that this was no ordinary Muscadet vintner. The 2004's and 2005's I tasted from bottle smelled more like great Chablis than anything else. It's been a long time since I was speechless when tasting a wine, but that was the case on that first visit. I was hooked from the first wine." Jon-David Headrick