Combel La Serre 'Le Lac aux Cochons' 2020

“If anyone orders Malbec, I’m leaving. I am NOT drinking any f****** Malbec!”, Miles might have raged if the movie Sideways had been made today. So popular is Malbec (aka Côt, Auxerrois, Pressac – it has over a thousand synonyms) in 2024 that its fruity blandness and smoooooth texture have almost become synonymous with red wine. But it’s not all rubbish.

For generations Jean-Pierre Ilbert’s family sold grapes to the local co-operative until he combined their vineyard holdings and established Combel-La-Serre in the tiny Cahors village of Cournou. In 2005, Jean-Pierre’s son Julien – having studied in Saint-Emilion – took over, first converting the estate to organics and later biodynamics.

Julien now farms 25ha of vines high on Cahors’ limestone plateau to produce ambitious riffs on Malbec in various forms. An iron-rich plot of 60-year-old vines next to a watering hole for wild boar, ‘Le Lac aux Cochons’ is aged for 24 months in old and new barrels. Refined and velvety, it shows serious ageing potential.