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Daedalus, Matt and Dan.
Matt Taylor, owner of Matt Taylor Wines, is our guest today on California Wine Country with Dan Berger and Daedalus Howell. This is his first time on the show. Dan Berger did talk a little about Chenin Blanc in this recent episode. On April 30 this year, Matt Taylor was the subject of a feature story in the New York Times.
Chenin Blanc is coming back. It was popular in the 1970s. It was sometimes a sweet wine, but it can be dry. Today winemakers prefer to make dry Chenin Blanc and Dan approves. Matt has brought the first bottling of Chenin Blanc from the Mammoth Rock vineyard on the Sonoma Coast.
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Chenin Blanc was sweet for centuries even in the Loire Valley. People are making it dry only in this century. Matt works with Pinot Noir and Chardonnay on the Sonoma Coast. But in 2016 he tasted a Chenin Blanc and that was a revelation. It put him on a path to the Loire Valley. He brought some budwood back and planted a vineyard in Sonoma Coast about 10 years ago. (That’s why it’s known as the Samsonite Clone.) This is the first bottling of that wine and Dan thinks it is spectacular.
Chenin Blanc Then and Now
Why was Chenin Blanc always a sweet wine? Dan explains that decades ago, nobody had invented a filter that was tight enough to get rid of all the sugar and yeast. It wasn’t until 1943 that the filter was invented and 1947 before it was applied to the wine. Now we have been making dry Chenin Blanc that has personality, terroir and depth from aging in barrels. This is everything Chenin Blanc could have been but never was.
This wine is soft in the aftertaste but not sweet. The pH is about 3 and 12.2% alcohol. 2023 was a long season. He picked in late October or November. In 30 minutes after breathing, it will transform. There is a brightness to the wine that pairs with oysters and abalone. Dan says that Matt took a risk when he put Chenin Blanc in this place, because it is so cold is hard to get the grapes to ripen. You have to push Chenin Blanc to its limits in a cold climate.
Matt Taylor pours a tasting in the Loire Valley every year or two. Sometimes the wines don’t travel so well, so having this high caliber domestic production is an advantage for us here.