Southern Burgundy is in the spotlight. Côte Chalonnaise and Mâcon make affordable wines in villages that are not as hyped as in the Côte d’Or. In Mâcon, two small white wine appellations, Pouilly-Loché and Pouilly-Vinzelles, have recently been awarded premier cru vineyards.
INAO, the state body that supervises the appellations, does not hand out premier cru (not to mention grand cru) easily. It takes time. For Loché and Vinzelles, it began in 2006 with, among other things, geological studies of the soil.
The result is that Pouilly-Loché (a total of 32 hectares) has been awarded one premier cru: Les Mûres (7.09 ha).
Pouilly-Vinzelles (52 ha in total) has been awarded three: Les Longeays (7.50 ha), Les Pétaux (2.76 ha) and Les Quarts (12.45 ha).
The rules for these four premier cru vineyards are a little stricter than the plain village wines. The yield is limited to 58 hl/ha (instead of 62). The wines must be aged a little longer and may only be sold from July 15 following the harvest. All chemical weeding is prohibited and manual harvesting is mandatory. This last rule is a bit strange, especially for white wines. In Chablis, for instance, a large part of all grapes is harvested by machine.
The larger neighbour Pouilly-Fuissé, with 800 hectares, was awarded premier cru vineyards in 2020. And quite a lot of them, 22 in total, 24% of the appellation’s surface.
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