Fifth-generation winemaker Jonathan Pabiot took over the family winery in 2010. ‘We didn’t keep a single customer,’ he says, ‘because we stopped making Sauvignon Blanc-style Sauvignon Blanc’. Jonathan cut yields and went organic. He adopted wild yeast fermentations, biodynamic viticulture, extensive lees stirring, for texture, and an array of maturation vessels ranging from concrete to neutral 500-litre barrels. He understood that terroir is the calling card of the great wines of the Loire, just as elsewhere, and focussed on older vines in distinctive parcels. Writing on vinous.com, Rebecca Gibb MW has noted that Pabiot is now ‘definitely in the Pouilly-Fumé A league’.

The Pabiot vines lie on 20 hillside hectares around the village of Les Loges, in sight of the river. That proximity to the river is responsible for a very humid climate. Jonathan says the contrast between the fresh, cool mornings and the heat in the afternoons accounts for the minerality in his wines. The Aubaine cuvée comes from plots thick with limestone pebbles (‘a hell for my plough’). It’s all elegance, with citrusy fruit, a floral, leesy palate and a hint of bitterness on the finish. Luminance comes from terraces planted on Kimmeridgian marl (shell limestone); it is pure and refined, with the density to age beautifully. (NT 31/07/25)