Marqués de Riscal Barón de Chirel Viñas Centenarias Verdejo 2016 Rueda, Castilla y León, Spain 75cl

Herederos del Marqués de Riscal is one of Spain’s most historic wine names, founded in 1858 and famous first for its Rioja. It carried that experience south into Rueda to make serious white wine, and Barón de Chirel honours Carlos Hurtado de Amézaga, who modernised the family firm in the post-war years.

This is pure Verdejo from pre-phylloxera, ungrafted bush vines more than 100 years old, in the Segovian villages of Aldeanueva del Codonal and Aldehuela. The old vines are the whole point. Deep-rooted, tiny-yielding and hand-harvested, they give a concentration and complexity that everyday Rueda, made from young, trellised vines, rarely reaches.

The 2016 vintage gave ripe, healthy fruit in Rueda while retaining good natural acidity, ideal for a white built to develop in bottle rather than be drunk straight from the fridge.

Six months on the lees in small Austrian oak vats build texture and a subtle savoury depth without masking the grape. Expect citrus and orchard fruit, fennel, aniseed and dried herb, a stony mineral thread and a palate that is rich and broad yet kept bright by that acidity, finishing long. It is a food wine: try it with roast chicken, hake, grilled white fish or a mature hard cheese, and serve it a touch warmer than a standard white to let the aromas open.

This is Verdejo as a serious, gastronomic white, rated 93 points by James Suckling and presented in a gift box. If you think of Rueda as simply light and fresh, this reframes what the grape and its oldest vines can do, and stands comfortably alongside far pricier whites.