El Escocés Volante Papa Luna Garnacha-Syrah-Mazuelo 2022, Calatayud

Papa Luna is a Garnacha-led red from El Escocés Volante, the Calatayud project of Scottish Master of Wine Norrel Robertson. It is a blend of around 75% Garnacha, 20% Syrah and 5% Mazuelo (Carignan), sourced from small plots of old bush vines on the hillsides around Calatayud, many of them 60 to over 100 years old. Calatayud’s heat and its old vines give the wine its depth. The wine is aged for around five months in a mix of French and American oak, enough to round it out without masking the fruit, and its style is often likened to Châteauneuf-du-Pape. The name honours Pedro Martínez de Luna, the Aragonese cardinal who became the antipope Benedict XIII and is remembered in Spain as ‘Papa Luna’.

In the glass it is dark and deep. The nose is expressive, with red and black berries, dark plum and spiced cherry, dried herbs such as thyme, and a hint of dark chocolate. The palate is rich, juicy and generous, with ripe fruit, a twist of Mediterranean spice, a silky, velvety texture and fine tannins.

Serve at around 16–18°C. It is a great match for barbecued meats, lamb chops, stews and casseroles, cottage or shepherd’s pie and chicken tagine. Enjoy it now or over the next few years.

El Escocés Volante, ‘the Flying Scotsman’, is the family wine company of Norrel Robertson MW, run with Sharon Robertson in Calatayud, Aragón. Born in Dundee and raised in Scotland, Norrel worked in the wine trade before learning winemaking from the cellar up in Chianti, Portugal, Australia, France and Chile. He became a Master of Wine in 2000 and moved to Spain in 2003, where the old Garnacha vineyards of Calatayud inspired him to start making his own wines. He works with old, dry-grown vines at altitude around villages such as Villarroya de la Sierra, Cervera de la Cañada and Torralba de Ribota, focusing on native varieties, above all Garnacha. The vineyards have been farmed organically since 2014, without irrigation or pesticides, and the team turns vine prunings into biochar and uses labels made from sugar cane and hemp paper.