Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/518118
76 / the tasting panel / june 2015 COVER STORY "It's taken some time, but the Mount George vineyard is where we want it," said Emmerich, standing at the top of a slope—about 400 feet in elevation—with the peak of Mount George rising up behind him. Surveying the vineyard looking due southwest, rolling waves of Cabernet Sauvignon—the majority of which are Silverado's own Heritage clone, UCD30, one of only three heritage Cabernet clones in California—transition down to blocks of Merlot and Cabernet Franc planted to the mountain's apron. Fifty-six acres of the 110-acre vineyard are planted to Cabernet Sauvignon, with 34 acres of Merlot and less than five acres each of Petit Verdot, Cabernet Franc and Malbec making up the balance. Improving wine quality in the field at Mount George has been a priority for Emmerich, one that necessitated some radical changes to vineyard architecture and the way the estate was being farmed. He began converting cordon-trained vines to cane pruning and planning a long-term replanting project. "We got ahead of phylloxera at the same time," he said. When replanting, he phased out terracing and, instead, followed the natural contours of the land from north to south and using vineyard architecture designed to optimize the site. Emmerich's vision for the historic vineyard has paid off in spades as now show- cased by the silky, fine-grained tannins that characterize GEO. This newest, single- vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon joins the winery's five other single-vineyard wines including SOLO, the highly-lauded, mono-varietal Silverado Heritage Cabernet Sauvignon from the Silverado Vineyard in Stags Leap. Left to right: General Manager Russ Weis, Winemaker Jon Emmerich and Vice President, Sales Clint Wilsey.