SommSelect Editorial Director David Lynch sings the praises of Domaine de l’Ecu’s Frederik Niger, who’s forever reminding us that the Loire Valley’s Pays Nantais is about much more than Muscadet.
Although the actual Domaine de l’Ecu is at the very top of my “need to visit” list, I did get to meet its proprietor, Frederik “Fred” Niger, at a tasting hosted by his West Coast importer a few years ago in San Francisco. Trade tastings often take on the feel of a high school cafeteria—lots of sommelier preening and cliquishness—and Fred’s table was reliably crowded with cool kids throughout the day. But he couldn’t have been more gracious and unassuming in presenting a range of wines that not only justified the hero worship but extended well beyond what I thought the Pays Nantais, a.k.a. Muscadet Country, was capable of. Yes, the headliners were his impeccable, mineral-driven Muscadets from Sèvre et Maine, but there was Chardonnay, killer Pinot Noir and Cabernet Franc (both offered on SommSelect), and this Champagne-method sparkler, “La Divina,” which seemed to be Fred’s way of saying—quietly, humbly, yet unequivocally—that he can do anything. I all but asked for his autograph after the tasting, and let me be clear about today’s wine, “La Divina”: Sparkling wine of this quality has no business being this inexpensive. I don’t know how it’s possible given the added labor and time required to produce a sparkler in the méthode traditionelle (‘traditional method’), not to mention the added costs of farming biodynamically, as Niger does. We’re always on the lookout for ‘non-Champagne’ sparklers that rival Champagne and “La Divina” takes its rightful place at the top of this category. Grab as much as you can fit; you’re going to want to have it handy!
And just as the Domaine de l’Ecu story doesn’t begin and end with Muscadet (though if you haven’t tried their three soil-specific bottlings—“Gneiss,” “Orthogneiss,” and “Granite”—you need to do so), it starts not with Fred Niger but the visionary Guy Bossard. A passionate viticulturist and one of the early adopters of organic/biodynamic viticulture in the Loire, Bossard embraced “natural” winemaking and farming way back in the early 1970s, when most of his neighbors were industrializing their vineyards. He swore off chemicals, fertilizers, and herbicides, and even went so far as to de-modernize his cellar work. Bossard was certified organic by 1975 and certified biodynamic in 1998, putting him way ahead of the curve, but he didn’t have any heirs to pass his property—and his wisdom—along to. Enter Fred, who has worked side-by-side with Bossard for years and has now taken over viticulture and winemaking in earnest. Working with 25 hectares of vines in the Pays Nantais, Niger is the ultimate hands-on proprietor, parsing every inch of his territory en route to wines that are both immaculately clean and terroir-expressive. He currently bottles about 18 different cuvées, and as I noted above, there isn’t a dud in the bunch.
The Sèvre et Maine growing zone—named for two tributaries of the Loire that feed into it just before it empties into the Atlantic—is known for its patchwork of soil types. It’s a mix of igneous and metamorphic rock, with thin topsoils over subsoils that vary from granite to schist to gneiss. “La Divina” is sourced from two hectares of vines rooted in this patchwork, and is, not surprisingly, an interesting varietal mix of 30% Folle Blanche (a grape better known for its use in Armagnac), 30% Chardonnay, 20% Melon (the Muscadet grape) and 20% Cabernet Sauvignon (yes, Cabernet Sauvignon, which Niger also uses in an unoaked varietal bottling called “Rednoz”). It undergoes its secondary fermentation in the bottle, à la Champagne (the terms méthode traditionnelle and méthode Champenoise are synonymous), and spends a minimum of 12 months aging on its lees before final bottling without any dosage (sugar addition).
Bone-dry (it’s an Extra-Brut) and lively, La Divina is a pale straw-gold in the glass, with bright aromas of salted lemon, green apple, white cherry, dried flowers and crushed stones that carry through to the refreshing, medium-bodied palate. The texture is fine and filigree, with a pronounced stone/mineral finish that whets the appetite for a bite of food. It will make a superb
apéritif alongside some blinis with smoked salmon and will prompt more than a few iPhone photographs by guests should you choose to serve it at a larger gathering. It is truly impressive wine at this price, to say the very least, and as always, we urge you to forego flutes in favor of ‘regular’ white wine glasses. Ideal service temperature is 50 degrees, though a touch colder won’t hurt. Whenever the occasion calls for a sparkler at a ‘non-Champagne’ price, you’ll be very happy to have this one in your back pocket. Cheers!
— David Lynch
