Our Participating Chefs + Winemakers
Wine Makers
JP Valot (He/Him/His)
Valcan is our creative outlet, a representation of our family, heritage, and vision for the future. It is our legacy and a tradition we hope to pass on to our children and share with our customers.
JP Valot is a modern winegrower and hospitality entrepreneur bridging vineyard stewardship, winemaking, and cultural experiences between Argentina and the Pacific Northwest.
Adrian Cornejo
Over 20 years experience in the industry has blossomed into an adventurous selection of handcrafted, all natural & authentic wines sure to please your palate!
Using low intervention, traditional, sustainable & organic vineyard methods and natural-fermentation wine production encapsulates the essence of the areas where the grapes are grown within each hand picked cluster.
Gabriel
Elena Rodriguez
3rd generation farmer. 1st generation Mexican American. Founder of Alumbra Cellars and co-founder of Latino Makers Food & Wine.
Elena's story starts with her father, Baudelio Rodriguez, who immigrated from Durango, Mexico to Oregon in 1996.
By 2005, that land held rows of Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris. Elena grew up on that soil and today, she's the one crafting the wine, carrying her father's vision forward as one of the few Latina winemakers in the Pacific Northwest.
Cristina Gonzalez
Cristina Gonzales is the granddaughter of migrant farm workers from Texas, who moved to Wisconsin to pick cherries in search of a better life. Her passion for wine began while traveling as a backpacker through South America in 2004 and landing in Mendoza, Argentina, the epicenter of South American Malbec. When she returned to the United States, she entered the wine industry and eagerly gained hands-on experience, working harvests in California, Oregon, Tasmania, and Australia. She launched Gonzales Wine Company in 2010, which strives to create minimal intervention, small production, accessible wines. Representation Matters. Gonzales wines strive to serve, inspire and motivate other underrepresented communities that anything is possible. Cristina serves on the Oregon Wine Board and is the Program Coordinator of AHIVOY. She resides in Portland, Oregon with her son, Julian, their cattle dog, Bean and makes bold red and aromatic white wines from Washington and Oregon grapes at Ricochet Wine Company in McMinnville, Oregon.
Chefs
Dustin Joseph (He/Him/His)
Biscuit & Pickles Catering is the creation of Chef Dustin Joseph. After 26 years in the restaurant industry as an executive chef and restaurateur all over the country, he sought to expand his culinary freedom and celebrate food the way it should be celebrated: simple and delicious. It's our philosophy that food should taste great and bring us all together!
Mario Aranda
Shaped by the cuisines of South, Central, and North America, Mexican chef Mario Aranda explores the relationship between geography, culture, and history through food. He views each plate as a canvas where every ingredient carries meaning, and flavor becomes the language that tells the story of a place and its people.
Ricardo Antunez
Restaurant kid at heart, restaurateur, and co-founder of Latino Makes Food & Wine.Growing up in Northern California surrounded by farmland, some of Ricardo's earliest memories are of harvesting tomatillos alongside his uncles. Today, living in Oregon, he sees many of those same landscapes reflected in the Willamette Valley.