2018 Gamble Family Vineyards The Mill Keeper Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley 750 ml

Gamble Family Vineyards is headquartered a stone’s throw from Screaming Eagle ($3,800), down the street from Opus One ($397), and within a few-minute drive of a constellation of stars like Silver Oak ($139) and Staglin ($268).

Yet today’s bottle is available at an astounding value price... about the same amount that VIPs tip drivers to ferry them up and down this iconic stretch of the St. Helena Highway.

For the Mill Keeper’s unbelievable price, you can sample Cabernet greatness harvested from across the estate’s storied 175 acres in Oakville as well as Mt. Veeder and Rutherford. A 100-year family history in the region enabled the Gambles to acquire this coveted terroir, and to continue offering wines at incredible bargains like this one.

These sites are so highly valued, their grapes are snapped up by a who’s who of Napa producers: Thomas Rivers Brown (author of a bevy of 100-pointers), Paul Hobbs, Far Niente’s Nickel & Nickel, and Philippe Melka, to name a few.

Produced from inside one of the most exclusive inner sanctums of Napa real estate, this dark, unctuous 2018 Cabernet Sauvignon is a deal that only an Oakville original could make. Third-generation farmer Tom Gamble has roots that go deeper than most vines in these parts. His wife Colette’s local lineage goes back even further, all the way to the 1870s. As Oakville has flourished into one of the world’s foremost playgrounds for deep-pocketed oenophiles, Tom has stayed true to a simple but hardworking approach to viticulture. It’s said he has the fanciest horse in Napa because it grazes land right next door to Screaming Eagle’s famed property.

He hasn’t bought into the idea that just because something comes out of Oakville, it should cost ten times more. “I’m a fan of the old Iroquois teaching of the seventh-generation principle,” Tom told us. “Every decision you make, you consider how it’ll affect the people and land seven generations into the future.” That kind of thinking, and the Gamble’s long history of land ownership here, are what make fantastic values like today’s possible.

We’ve seen the vineyards that make up the Mill Keeper bottling from the back of Tom’s 1963 flatbed GMC truck. Sunlight blazed through the dust kicked up by the tires, warming vines still sparkling with morning dew and instilling big-shouldered concentration in the grapes. The incredible green health of the vines, and the smell in the air of fresh, organically cultivated soil, offered confirmation that this was indeed a farmer’s wine.

The same in-demand sites fuel the awesome power and energy that define this bottling. The dense purple core and magenta rim foreshadow the immense concentration that awaits in the glass, and the nose offers similar clues: steeped violets and blackberry compote, kissed with menthol and spice. The mouthfeel is grand and muscular, with a broad tannic structure giving way to juicy depth and a smoky, grippy finish.

20 months in 40% new French oak buffs up all that farm freshness into an opulent, glamorous package worthy of its famous neighbors—and accompanied by an even more impressive price.