Curating Eater Wine Club's July wines is Lauren Friel, who’s made her mark on the Boston wine scene. Starting off as a server at Oleana in Cambridge, she developed an interest in wine and went on to become the restaurant’s wine director, followed by gigs at several other major restaurants including NYC’s Dirt Candy (where she curated the country’s only all-female wine list).

She founded natural wine bar Rebel Rebel in 2018 with a focus on integrating activism, philanthropy, and inclusivity into the business model. Her latest venture is Wild Child, a newly-opened hybrid shop offering intersectional literature and natural wine to go.  

Lauren’s theme in July focused on the wines we’re packing in our coolers for the beach (or park, boat ride, cookout…). Something that’s easy drinking to sip on between diving into the waves, or to accompany a summer sunset after a long day outdoors. 

Here are the wines we lugged outdoors in July:

• Vini Sassara ‘Rebel Rebel’ Rosato — This is a skin-contact pinot grigio that’s pink in the glass, since pinot grigio is a naturally pink-skinned grape, and extended contact with the skins during the winemaking process pulls all that gorgeous rosy color into the wine. It’s fresh and clean, but the skin contact lends a crunchy stone-fruited structure and tropical citrus buoyancy to the palate. Think biting into an underripe white peach.
• Southold Farm + Cellar ‘Weight of the Moment’ — This red is 100 percent teroldego from Long Island, New York. (Teroldego is a native to Italy grape that  typically makes for a bold-but-juicy red wine.) Here, it's forest-fruited with mineral-driven focus that’s somehow delicate and powerful all at once. This wine is light, aromatic, and vibrant. Drink it with a chill and alongside whatever’s on the grill tonight.
• Domaine de la Pépière ‘La Pepie’ — This wine comes from Pépière, an old-school producer widely considered to be among the greatest — not just in the Muscadet region but in all of France. It’s 100 percent melon de Bourgogne that’s purely classic yet versatile. It’s racy, salty, and full of pithy citrus zip. Pair it with oysters, steamed clams, soft-shell crab, and bocce. Plus, if you’re cooking seafood at home, a splash of this in the pan or pot would also be excellent. This is the wine Lauren tries to have a case of on hand all summer long. 
• NV Azimut Brut Cava — This wine is a blend of macabeo, xarel-lo, and parellada which are all farmed organically and then fermented with wild yeasts in bottle. After that it’s aged for a minimum of 10 months using biodynamic cellar practices. The result is crisp and joyful, and packed with a fine bubble. The nose is full of green orchard fruits; you could easily mistake this for good Champagne. Drink it on its own, or pair it with lobster in lots of good butter and a pile of summer greens.

Craving more beach-worthy bottles? Stock up on more of this month's wine, thanks to our friends at MYSA, to get you through the summer.