Alain & Loïc Cailbourdin, 2024 Update
There are a number of stars that shine very brightly in the Pouilly-Fumé appellation. One or two are very bright indeed. And some have shone so bright they seem to have eclipsed the appellation entirely, before then departing to take on the Vin de France designation.
But that, I think, is a story for another time.
For the moment let’s stick with those that shine within the appellation, starting with Alain Cailbourdin. Alain was a newcomer to wine when he found himself earning a few francs picking grapes back in the 1970s. The bug seems to have bitten deep, because after moving from his native Paris to Burgundy to study viticulture and winemaking, in 1980 he settled in Pouilly-sur-Loire, buying himself a couple of hectares of vines to keep himself busy. By 1985 this had grown to 6 hectares, and today he has more than 20 hectares planted up.
Alain has thus now worked more than 40 vintages on his domaine, an impressive innings, and while he still seems sprightly and full of beans it is perhaps no surprise that the next generation, in the shape of Loïc Cailbourdin, is now stepping up to the plate. It is an interesting transition, as vintage-by-vintage, the cuvées are being redefined and dressed in new labels, and every time this happens the name on the label changes from Alain to Loïc. It is almost as if the domaine is being handed down in stealth mode, wine by wine; one day we will wake up and Loïc’s name will be everywhere, and Alain’s nowhere to be seen, and we will wonder when it all happened.
Well, maybe.
While this slow-rolling transition is ongoing, the wines seem as interesting as ever, sometimes even more so. I always enjoy stopping off here to taste and wish I could spend more time drinking the wines at home (I think that of a lot of wines I taste; too many wines, not enough time or hepatocytes). In this report I check out a number of new releases from Alain and Loïc, focusing only on wines that have been bottled, including their three principal cuvées in the 2022 vintage, tasted from bottle for the first time, and the two Triptyque cuvées, in the 2019 vintage.
