Marqués de Cáceres Gaudium 2015 Rioja, Spain 75cl

Marqués de Cáceres helped modernise Rioja from the 1970s, marrying traditional fruit with French winemaking ideas. Gaudium, meaning joy in Latin, is the house’s flagship red, made only in the strongest years from its finest old-vine parcels, and always in small quantities.

The blend is largely Tempranillo, Rioja’s noble grape, with a small proportion of Graciano for lift and aromatic complexity. What sets Gaudium apart is the age of its vines: parcels of more than seventy years, with some pre-phylloxera plots over a century old, cropping tiny yields of intensely concentrated fruit. The wine is matured in French oak.

The 2015 vintage in Rioja was a warm, generous year that produced ripe, full-bodied reds with plenty of structure, a fitting profile for a wine built to age. This is a Gaudium with both power and balance, the fruit ripe but never heavy, the oak folded in rather than sitting on top.

Expect a deep, dark core and a complex nose of black fruit, fine tobacco, cedar and sweet vanilla spice. The palate is powerful and layered, with savoury tannins, dark chocolate depth and a long, mineral finish. It drinks well now with air, and will continue to develop for years in the cellar. Serve with roast lamb, game or aged Manchego.

This is Rioja at its most serious and rewarding, an old-vine expression from one of the region’s landmark producers. If you love mature, structured reds and want to see what Rioja can do at the top end, Gaudium is a benchmark.