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Human Cellars 'Inês' Skin Contact White
Human Cellars 'Inês' Skin Contact White
Grapes — Viognier and Riesling, co-fermented (typically around 70/30)
Region — Eola-Amity Hills AVA, Willamette Valley, Oregon
Tasting Notes — Glowing amber-gold. Baked yellow apple flecked with basil on the nose, opening into lemon peel, dried apricot, and honeysuckle. The palate is lean and crisp rather than heavy, with a saline, saltine-cracker minerality from the basalt soils and a gentle tannic grip from the skin contact. Riesling's acidity cuts straight through Viognier's natural richness. Wine Enthusiast called it mad genius territory, which is fair, and then noted that it works, which is the important part.
The Wine — A co-fermented skin contact white from vines planted on the small farm where the Berenguer family lives, on the south side of the Eola-Amity Hills. The soils are basalt, remnants of ancient lava flows, and the AVA is defined by the Van Duzer Corridor funneling cold Pacific air across the hills in the afternoons, which is what keeps acidity intact in a variety as prone to flab as Viognier.
The Viognier ferments about eight days on its skins with minimal cap management, then is blended with Riesling and finished in stainless steel, resting six to eight months on the lees before bottling unfined and unfiltered.
The name honors Inês of Porto, a friend of the winery who sings fado in the tascas and builds collectives to support the city's traditional trades and its young artists. Her conviction is that a city is only as strong as the artists in it, and her work is to make things more authentic, more fun, and more beautiful. Like its namesake, this is a wine that takes a traditional grape and does something unexpected with it.
Farming — Farmed without chemicals on basalt soils, cultivated according to biodynamic principles though not formally certified. The estate vines sit on the family's own small farm. Human Cellars takes its name from one of the core ideas of biodynamics: that human, vineyard, and nature exert equal influence on one another and cannot be separated into neat, single roles.
Winemaking — Co-fermented with eight days of skin contact on the Viognier and minimal cap management. Finished in stainless steel, six to eight months on lees. Bottled unfined and unfiltered. Minimal intervention throughout.
The Producer — Human Cellars is the project of Emily and Bryan Berenguer, who spent two decades living and working across Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Europe before settling on a small farm in the Eola-Amity Hills. Every wine they make is named for someone they met in those twenty years abroad, someone who changed how they thought about the world. Their slogan is thoughtful wines inspired by extraordinary humans, and it is meant literally.
Their process is unusual and rather touching: before making a wine, the two of them sit down and try to remember who, in all those years overseas, made them want to be better people. Then they build a wine and a label around that person and the place they came from. The Viognier is named for the Corsican village of Lozzi, home of their friend Myriam. A Pinot Noir and Gamay blend carries the Burmese title Sayar Mah, given to fearless and innovative women.
The dedication on this bottle reads as a kind of mission statement for the whole project: to those who have discovered their sense of place after decades of wandering, to those who have found peace after years of restlessness, to those who have started over again for the last time, to those who have finally found their way home.
Drink It With — Grilled octopus, salt cod fritters, roast chicken with herbs, charcuterie, aged sheep's cheese, or Portuguese food of any description with fado playing.
Human Cellars 'Inês' Skin Contact White
Grapes — Viognier and Riesling, co-fermented (typically around 70/30)
Region — Eola-Amity Hills AVA, Willamette Valley, Oregon
Tasting Notes — Glowing amber-gold. Baked yellow apple flecked with basil on the nose, opening into lemon peel, dried apricot, and honeysuckle. The palate is lean and crisp rather than heavy, with a saline, saltine-cracker minerality from the basalt soils and a gentle tannic grip from the skin contact. Riesling's acidity cuts straight through Viognier's natural richness. Wine Enthusiast called it mad genius territory, which is fair, and then noted that it works, which is the important part.
The Wine — A co-fermented skin contact white from vines planted on the small farm where the Berenguer family lives, on the south side of the Eola-Amity Hills. The soils are basalt, remnants of ancient lava flows, and the AVA is defined by the Van Duzer Corridor funneling cold Pacific air across the hills in the afternoons, which is what keeps acidity intact in a variety as prone to flab as Viognier.
The Viognier ferments about eight days on its skins with minimal cap management, then is blended with Riesling and finished in stainless steel, resting six to eight months on the lees before bottling unfined and unfiltered.
The name honors Inês of Porto, a friend of the winery who sings fado in the tascas and builds collectives to support the city's traditional trades and its young artists. Her conviction is that a city is only as strong as the artists in it, and her work is to make things more authentic, more fun, and more beautiful. Like its namesake, this is a wine that takes a traditional grape and does something unexpected with it.
Farming — Farmed without chemicals on basalt soils, cultivated according to biodynamic principles though not formally certified. The estate vines sit on the family's own small farm. Human Cellars takes its name from one of the core ideas of biodynamics: that human, vineyard, and nature exert equal influence on one another and cannot be separated into neat, single roles.
Winemaking — Co-fermented with eight days of skin contact on the Viognier and minimal cap management. Finished in stainless steel, six to eight months on lees. Bottled unfined and unfiltered. Minimal intervention throughout.
The Producer — Human Cellars is the project of Emily and Bryan Berenguer, who spent two decades living and working across Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Europe before settling on a small farm in the Eola-Amity Hills. Every wine they make is named for someone they met in those twenty years abroad, someone who changed how they thought about the world. Their slogan is thoughtful wines inspired by extraordinary humans, and it is meant literally.
Their process is unusual and rather touching: before making a wine, the two of them sit down and try to remember who, in all those years overseas, made them want to be better people. Then they build a wine and a label around that person and the place they came from. The Viognier is named for the Corsican village of Lozzi, home of their friend Myriam. A Pinot Noir and Gamay blend carries the Burmese title Sayar Mah, given to fearless and innovative women.
The dedication on this bottle reads as a kind of mission statement for the whole project: to those who have discovered their sense of place after decades of wandering, to those who have found peace after years of restlessness, to those who have started over again for the last time, to those who have finally found their way home.
Drink It With — Grilled octopus, salt cod fritters, roast chicken with herbs, charcuterie, aged sheep's cheese, or Portuguese food of any description with fado playing.