A Gemstone of a Wine One of Napa Valley best James Paxton
You probably won’t find Gemstone wines at your favorite store or even on line, so my advice is to hasten to a restaurant near you that serves Gemstone wine. I am sure it will be among your favorites.
At our last meal at The French Laundry (which we still think is the best restaurant in America), we made a discovery: Meritage 2000 from Gemstone Winery. Superb wine. We’ll pass on the black cherry, mocha and other such descriptions used by the oenologists. Great wine and we liked it a lot. So compliments to The Laundry’s sommelier, because this Gemstone Meritage was the perfect complement to the meal.
The next day, I just had to get some Gemstone Meritage to bring back home. Since we were staying at the Huntington in San Francisco and not in Napa Valley, I went online to make sure the Gemstone vineyard had some available before I drove back out to Yountville. Uh-oh. “We regret that all Gemstone and Facets wines are sold out at this time. Please visit our restaurant page for availability near you.”
That night’s dinner was scheduled for Garry Danko. But before I set out, I decided to check a few favorite online wine sites. For once, Sherry-Lehmann was disappointing, but I got quite a lot of information on the different wines of the Gemstone Winery and their prices from Winefetch.
Gary Danko, a favorite San Francisco restaurant, has an outstanding wine list with a first-class selection of California reds. This is a great place to prepare a trip to the wine region. But alas, the sommelier had only two wines from the Gemstone Winery to offer: a Facets 2003, which is a second wine from Gemstone, a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Cabernet Franc; and a Gemstone 2003.
I chose the Gemstone 2003 which, at $230 a bottle, is a steal. It was a great Cabernet Sauvignon. But I preferred the Meritage 2000 at The Laundry—more supple, more elegant. This is not surprising, since I am a Bordeaux aficionado, with the firm belief that Bordeaux are the greatest wines ever made by man from the blending of several grapes. Unfortunately, my wife is Burgundy all the way. Mono grape, Pinot Noir. Talk to her about Russian River not about Gironde …
What impresses me so much about the Gemstone Winery is that owners Suzie and Paul Frank, not only have chosen the difficult path of grape blending, but from grapes of the same vineyard. Their Meritage is made from Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Petit Verdot, all coming from their 16-acre vineyard in Yountville, off the Silverado trail. It’s the level of quality of the different grapes after the harvest that defines the percentage that Philippe Meka, the über-talented Gemstone winemaker originally from Bordeaux, uses to make Meritage and Facets.
