Special Projects - 'Thunder Egg' - Red & White Blend - Willamette Valley - Eola-Amity Hills, Willamette Valley, OR - 2025

Notes from the Winery/Importer

WINE MAKER: Dan Rinke VINTAGE: 2025 LOCATION: Willamette Valley VINEYARD: Eola-Amity ASPECT: Gentle hills ALTITUDE: 500 feet VINE AGE: 2010 SOIL COMPOSITION: Rocky marine sediment, sandstone and shale interspersed with ancient oyster shells CLIMATE: Mediterranean, cold winters FARMING: Certified biodynamic GRAPE COMPOSITION: Pinot Gris with 5% Pinot Noir from Morning Mist HARVEST: By hand, 3rd week of September MACERATION: 6 weeks skin contact; combination of press juice, destemmed and whole-cluster fruit FERMENTATION: Fast and hot with lots of oxygen; free-run juice after fermentation into used barrique AGING: 3 months in used barrique FINING & FILTRATION: None SO2: 15 ppm ALCOHOL: 11.8% BOTTLED: 2/24/2026 BOTTLES PRODUCED: 700 An Oregonian Ryšák: reddish, convivial, temperature-flexible, fruity, savory and modest in alcohol.

• Black Lamb Imports

  Notes on the Producer

  Cultural exchange is the essence of Black Lamb, more than alcohol, culture is what we deal in. This makes the ‘laundromat shakedown’ style tariffs an especially hot pile of shit; and then there is how they spend our extorted monies. We can take some small relief in that history is on the side of wine. Nations are young, wine culture is old. Any border where there is viticultural history establishes that the culture of wine came before the border. The adaptive abilities of those who tend the vine are the source of wine’s persistence. So, we too can adapt.

In November of 24’, we visited Dan Rinke and his partner Kim Hamblin at Art + Science to drink a little cider, and such, and to see the many foraged fruits collected in their cooler that would soon be crushed. Dan shared some wines that were not part of their production. He explained they were made from unsold fruit destined to be sold to a distillery to recoup some of the vineyard costs. We tasted Pinot Noir, Grüner Veltliner, and Zweigelt. Each wine was a feather, super light and gentle, as light wine is better for distillation. We liked the lot so much that we made plans to bottle a mixed barrel for our own drinking. During a subsequent visit we were playing around with the various components and Ryšák appeared. Combine this with our fear of unpredictable tariff costs and the 1 barrel became 8 barrels.Tomorrow we bottle and quickly it will be available.

Born of angst, a fledgling love of North West wine, and a compulsion towards cultural play, meet THUNDER EGG! This is the first bottling from SPECIAL PROJECTS; a collaboration between Oregon’s finest fruit, Black Lamb, and Dan Rinke (Art + Science). A thunderegg (or thunder egg) is a nodule-like rock, similar to a filled geode, that is formed within rhyolitic volcanic ash layers. It is the state rock of Oregon, representative of the region’s volcanic geology and now the inaugural SPECIAL PROJECT.

In addition to sourcing grapes from them, A university trained viticulturalist and expert in conscientious farming, Dan works with both vineyards as an organic/biodynamic viticultural consultant. This puts him in contact with growers who may have fruit for us to utilize for future SPECIAL PROJECTS.

We are grateful to be working with Dan and Kim on this project. We hope to continue as long as we can serve as an outlet to such high quality underutilized fruit. Perhaps in time the circumstances we are collectively suffering under will change and we will be a more diverse enterprise for it. We hope…