Tom Gamble is a fascinating farmer-turned-winegrower who has a lot of insights and character without being one. Since founding the winery in 2005, Gamble has nurtured it stage-by-stage to where the Gamble Family diversity of offerings and degree of quality have steadily grown in parallel. And it helps to have vineyards in Oakville. The 2017 Cairo (97% Cabernet, 3% Petit Verdot) is one of those wines which opens with a powerful yet elegant statement, here of rich chocolate-black and piquant-red fruits flowing into a dark creaminess, then the other elements tease themselves out – vanilla bean and mellow oak (almost half of it new, with 8% spicier American), Napa garrigue, cedar, toasty pecans, big but flavorful tannins. It isn’t afraid of being a big, bold wine, yet it remains more enticing rather than over-powering.
Gamble Family, Oakville – Napa Valley (California) Cabernet Sauvignon 2017
By Roger Morris