Sosabe Cellars

Sosabe Cellars. Founder and winemaker, Nuias DePina was born on the island of Fogo in the country of Cape Verde and moved to Lisbon, Portugal in 1974 for 6 months. His grandfather and great uncle Niculau and brother Joseph DePina immigrated to the U.S. in 1933. After Joseph returned to Cape Verde he spoke highly of Napa Valley and encouraged his nephew Juvenal to move to the U.S. for better job opportunities. Plus there was already a small Cape Verdean community in the San Francisco Bay Area. Cape Verde was still a colony of Portugal at the time. Juvenal immigrated to the U.S. in 1968, moved to St. Helena and began working for Beringer Vineyards in 1970.

Juvenal’s son Nuias came to Napa Valley in 1975 as a teenager with his mother and other siblings. He arrived and spoke no English. He remembers telling his father, “please send me back to Lisbon”. He and his family lived in tiny St. Helena at the time and he wished he was still living in the ‘big’ city. He father had the opportunity to send him back, but never did and decades later, Nuias admits this was a great decision.

While still in high school, Nuias soon began learning about growing grapes; he worked part time at Beringer Vineyard and later in the vineyards at Raymond Winery. For reference, by our own count there are 38 wineries still in business who were operating in 1975 or earlier in Napa Valley. How the valley has changed with now more than 500 physical wineries currently producing wines commercially and hundreds more of stand alone brands.

Nuias was hired on full time at Raymond in 1978 – remembering when the original Raymond Winery was built in 1979 (this building still exists). He learned viticulture and winemaking alongside Roy Raymond Sr., Walter Raymond and Craig Raymond. After nearly 50 years, Nuias retired as cellar master at Raymond in 2024.

Nuias learned winemaking by doing and then later took classes at Napa Valley College and also short courses at UC Davis. He already knew how to make wine but wanted to learn the science behind winemaking. The first first vintage of Sosabe Cellars was in 2001 – a Cabernet Sauvignon and a Sauvignon Blanc. That same year, he and his brother and a cousin purchased a 22-acre property along Highway 29 in Lake County. When fully planted it is 6 acres of vines. Between fires and droughts, farming the site has been challenging. The vineyard was planted to Tempranillo in 2023.

When Nuias started Sosabe, the wines were made at Raymond Winery; today the wines are made at Whiskey River Ranch in Pope Valley, a custom crush facility. This winery was originally founded by Norm Alumbaugh (died in 2014) and was called Eagle & Rose Winery. It was sold to the current ownership (Canadian, Vancouver) in 2014. Its 6,000 square foot cave was tunneled in 1984, among the first of the ‘modern day’ winery caves in Napa Valley.

Whisky Creek Winery offers a diversity of winemaking services for custom crush clients.

The property also houses a 3,700 foot long air strip and a hangar; the site was previously used as a parachute training facility during World War II. The old buildings that used to house a lodge and restaurant are still standing next to the air strip. In the late 1960s it was called the Usibelli Lodge with a restaurant known for its home-made ravioli. We’ve seen later references in old newspapers referring to the lodge as the Pope Valley Lodge, Nebiolini’s Pope Valley Lodge and eventually the Eagle & Rose Hotel & Restaurant (under Alumbaugh’s ownership).

Sosabe means ‘fun’ in the Cape Verde language, an attribute that is a very important part of the wine business. And for Nuias, the word fun summarizes the results of passion, curiosity and the ability to create something with your own hands that people enjoy consuming.

Cape Verde is a tiny 10-island country off the coast of West Africa (west of Senegal). It was a Portuguese colony until the country gained its independence on July 5, 1975. Nuis estimates there are between 40-45 Cape Verdeans in Napa Valley with a larger community in Sacramento, Hayward and other communities in southern California. But the largest community of Cape Verdeans is in Massachusetts, sometimes referred to as the, “10th island”. One of their most famous singers, Cesaria Evora (1941-2011) used to be referred to as the ‘barefoot diva’. One year she performed for the summer concert series at Robert Mondavi Winery.

Select Wines
The Sosabe Cellars wines are an expression of balanced and food friendly bottlings, but equally as important, a celebration of culture and heritage and ancestral roots.

Whites
The 2023 Sosabe Cellars White Wine Lake County Kriola is a blend of 70% Sauvignon Blanc and 30% Muscat. This wine is pale yellow in color; highly aromatic and immediately open-knitted, the bouquet offers alluring scents of pineapple, apricot, pineapple guava, passion fruit, lychee, ripe comise pear, white peaches, white nectarines, lemon zest, lemongrass and prominent floral aromas including of star jasmine and citrus blossom and a lingering hint of vanilla. Like the bouquet, the off-dry palate is also fruity with flavors of apricot, pineapple, pineapple guava, kiwi, lychee, white nectarine, tangerine, lemon juice, kumquat and Babcock peach. The palate also features a light minerally character. The bright acidity balances the residual sugar quite nicely. Easy drinking, this is the ideal candidate for a porch pounder or a summertime poolside sipper in the company of a light reading, perhaps something by novelist Carl Hiassen or Clive Cussler. The alcohol is a refreshing 13%. The name Kriola refers to a Cabo Verdean woman.

The 2023 Sosobe Cellars Sauvignon Blanc, Lake County is medium straw in color; the bouquet offers an initial attractive union of both pineapple and lemon grass with additional aromas including honeysuckle, star jasmine, guava, passion fruit, pomelo, grapefruit and lemon zest. This wine smells fresh and vibrant. Balanced across the palate, there are flavors of pineapple, guava, white nectarine, green apple, pineapple guava, passion fruit and grapefruit. The refreshing finish lingers with both fruit and an animated acidity which immediately begs another sip. We would love to pair this with one of two of our favorite Thai salads, a spicy yum woon sen pork, otherwise known as Thai glass noodle salad or yum talay (seafood salad). And for good measure, throw in a warm winter evening from a rooftop in Bangkok.

Reds
The 2022 Sosabe Cellars Tabanka Red North Coast is a blend of 50% Sacramento County, 31% Sonoma County and 19% Napa County grapes. Its varieties include Tannat, Pinot Noir, Zinfandel and Cabernet Sauvignon. The name Tabanka refers to an annual Cape Verdean event celebrating the country’s rich cultural heritage spanning both Africa and Europe. This wine is pale to medium purple in color; the attractive bouquet offers a union of darker fruits combined with barrel influences. These aromas include ripe Santa Rosa plum, boysenberry, blackberry, cherry cola, dried rose petals, mocha, espresso, cinnamon stick, old cedar box and dark chocolate. On the palate there are flavors of plum, dark raspberry, cherry, blackberry and Pakistani mulberry. This is a lighter style red in terms of texture; both oak and wood tannins are finely polished and linger softly with fruit and texture pacing each other in tandem on the finish. Lingers with a note of toasted oak, a subtle dusty character and dried tobacco leaf. This bottling would pair best with lighter cuts of beef including a top sirloin.

The 2021 Sosabe Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley (Coombsville) is 96% varietal; this wine was aged for 18 months in French oak barrels. It is deep ruby in color and nearly opaque; the simultaneously fresh and fruity bouquet offers an immediate aromatic hit of ripe blackberry, an aromatic that reminds us of walking on the edges of thorny patches picking ripe blackberries in late summer. And there are additional scents of dark plum, boysenberry jam, Persian mulberry, cassis and hints of mocha, cinnamon stick and clove. Bright and juicy across the palate, in a blind tasting we may not have guessed this is 15% alcohol as listed on the label. It offers flavors of Satsuma plum, blackberry, boysenberry and dark cherry with lingering notes of toasted oak, crushed peppercorn and dried herbs. The savory and dark spice filled finish lingers with grainy tannins and a persistent dusty character. Pair with a variety of BBQ meats; our choice would be a juicy T-bone steak.

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Total production varies each year and has ranged from around around 700 cases up to 2000 cases. The wines are sold primarily direct to consumer although some of the wines are available at select locations in Massachusetts through a small distributor. Locally, the wines are found in the gift shop at the Wine Train in downtown Napa – which incidentally has the best selection of wines from black owned Napa Valley wineries/brands and also at Sunshine Foods in St. Helena.

The wines can also be selectively found at restaurants in San Francisco. And sometimes Nuias and his daughter Felicia host tastings in Napa Valley including at RiverPointe Napa Valley in the city of Napa, at the Wine Train headquarters, Buster’s BBQ in the town of Calistoga and in conjunction with Black Vines.

For more information or to purchase wines, visit: www.sosabecellars.com