Wine Down Thursday: Skin Contact
July 23 from 6 to 7:30pm
Sampler: $20/person

It's hot outside! Beat the heat with us at Wine Down Thursday, where we're pouring three skin-contact wines from Spain, Italy, and Austria.

Skin-contact wine (sometimes called "orange wine") is made by letting white wine grapes hang out with their skins during fermentation, just like red wine. That extra contact time pulls in more color, texture, and tannin than a typical white, giving these wines a deeper hue, a little grip, and layers of flavor you won't find in a standard glass of white.

Don't let the name fool you, though. These aren't heavy, demanding wines. All three picks are bright, mineral-driven, and refreshing, proof that skin-contact wine can be just as thirst-quenching as your go-to summer white, with a lot more personality.

Featured Wines:
2024 Finca Parera Xarel·lo Vermell
Finca Parera’s Xarel·lo Vermell emerges from the Alt Penedès, where calcareous soils and Mediterranean influence shape one of Catalonia’s rarest indigenous varieties. A pink-skinned mutation of Xarel·lo, Vermell is scarcely planted and historically overlooked, yet prized for its structural depth and phenolic nuance. Its thicker skins and natural resilience suit low-intervention farming, aligning with Parera’s commitment to regenerative viticulture. The grape offers a distinctive expression of Penedès beyond the region’s sparkling identity, emphasizing texture, oxidative potential, and terroir transparency. In this context, Xarel·lo Vermell stands as both a preservation of viticultural heritage and a forward-looking exploration of Mediterranean varieties.

2025 Perusini Pinot Grigio Ramato
Perusini’s Pinot Grigio Ramato comes from Friuli Colli Orientali, where the grape achieves notable depth and structure. “Ramato,” meaning copper-toned, references a historic Friulian style in which Pinot Grigio’s pink skins undergo brief maceration, imparting color and phenolic texture. This method reflects the region’s long-standing tradition of treating Pinot Grigio less as a neutral white and more as a site-expressive variety. In Friuli, Ramato underscores the grape’s intrinsic link to skin contact, bridging contemporary interpretations with its historical identity and regional authenticity.

2023 Hajszan Neumann Grüner Veltliner Natural
Hajszan Neumann’s Grüner Veltliner Natural stands apart within Vienna’s urban viticultural landscape, where biodynamic farming meets a minimal-intervention ethos. This cuvée reinterprets Grüner through extended skin contact and unfiltered élevage, emphasizing structure, phenolic depth, and site expression over varietal convention. Rare for the region, it challenges expectations of Grüner’s typical precision, instead presenting a more textural, evolved form. As part of Vienna’s small but growing natural wine movement, it represents a distinctive, boundary-pushing articulation of both grape and place.