Encosta da Quinta Humus Rose' 2019

Humus Rosé is made by Rodrigo Filipe at Quinta do Paço in Alvorninha, within the Óbidos demarcated zone of the Lisboa wine region. The blend is Touriga Nacional, Arinto, and Fernão Pires, grown on clay and limestone soils about 20 kilometers from the Atlantic. The estate sits between the ocean and the Serra dos Candeeiros mountains, giving the vineyards a cool, humid microclimate that retards ripening and preserves high natural acidity.

Winemaking is deliberately unconventional for a rosé. The Touriga Nacional macerates on its own red skins for several hours, then the juice macerates with destemmed Arinto and Fernão Pires skins for approximately 30 days — a technique closer to orange wine than to a standard saignée rosé. Spontaneous fermentation occurs in stainless steel with wild yeasts, followed by 12 months of aging in 225-liter used oak barrels.

The wine is bottled unfiltered and unfined with no added sulfites. The extended skin contact gives the wine a salmon-pink color with slight cloudiness, structure more typical of a light red than a conventional rosé, and a chewy, almost tactile mid-palate. Flavors center on rhubarb, wild strawberry, and earth, with tart acidity and a mineral finish from the limestone terroir.

Encosta da Quinta has been organically certified since 2007. Rodrigo allows grasses to grow freely between vine rows and relies on natural compost and minimal copper-sulfur applications only when necessary.