Dos Dedos de Frente Syrah, Viognier 2018, Calatayud

El Escoces Volante is the project of the Scottish (but already ‘adopted’ in Spain) Norrel Robertson MW. He is one of the best and most admired winemakers in the country. He has been producing his own wines in Spain for 15 years. In the late 1990s Norrel decided to pursue his career in winemaking after a brief spell as a colleague of Edward Clarke. In 2003 he moved to Spain as a flying winemaker for the UK-based International Wine Services and quickly fell in love with the old Garnacha vineyards in the area of Calatayud. Soon after, he decided to start making his own wines in the region. He also leads and consults on projects in Murcia, Valencia and Galicia. Currently, Norrel owns 21 hectares (52 acres) of old-vine Garnacha around the villages of Villarroya de la Sierra and Cervera de la Cañada in Calatayud. Most of his vineyards range from 45 to 110 years old but he has also encouraged some new plantings too.

They believe their 10th release of this high-altitude, late-ripening Syrah is the most balanced to date. The 2018 Dos Dedos de Frente comes from two hectares in the village of Villarroya de la Sierra planted in 2000 with a selection from the Rhône on stony soils at 950 meters in altitude, and it also contains 5% Viognier. In previous vintages, they only used the Viognier skins, but in 2018 the grapes ripened at the same time, so they were able to ferment it with the whole berries. The grapes were handpicked the 12th of October and fermented after a six-day cold soak, then the wine matured for 12 months in 500- and 650-liter oak casks (he abandoned the 225-liter oak barrels when he started this cuvée in 2016, and there was a change in the wine when he started using larger barrels). This is showy and exuberant, more in the style of Guigal than Clape. It's expressive, open, spicy and smoky, with abundant, fine-grained and chalky tannins. It's juicy, full-bodied and manages to keep the freshness and tension. This is still extremely young, and it's going to need a couple of years in bottle to start expressing what it really is. It should age nicely, as it has the stuffing and balance to do so. 6,373 bottles were filled in November 2019

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