About Geraldine
In the 1970s, my grandmother, Francis Geraldine Downing, opened a bottle shop in Eagle Pass, Texas, called "The Gourmet Shop."
My memories of The Gourmet Shop are scant, but what I remember most about her store were the giant inflatable cigarettes, liquor bottles and Goldfish crackers she received from brand vendors and hung from the ceiling. As a kid, the unreachable toy-like swag caught my attention more than the wares on the shelves.
Geraldine smoked three packs of Marlboro Reds a day from the age of 14 until one day in her 80s, when her understandably irritated caretaker performed an exorcism to rid the house of "smoke demons." From that day until my grandmother died, she never smoked another cigarette.
Eagle Pass apparently did not have gourmet taste in the 1970s, and the store did not last many years. This is the only photo I could track down among all my cousins and family members. You can just make out the bottom of an inflatable whiskey bottle hanging from the ceiling.
We miss Charles & Geraldine very much.
About Geraldine's
Geraldine's Natural Wines is a neighborhood wine shop in Alamo Heights that also sells some craft beers, non-alcoholic beverages, assorted gifts and candy.
Our focus is on things that are natural, locally produced, or sourced from the regions where our wines are made. We buy wine from smaller wineries that produce limited batches that have been made using sustainable, organic or biodynamic farming practices and minimal human intervention. Nothing added, nothing taken away. By design, these smaller producers make more interesting, charismatic wines that are not represented in larger stores. Most of the stuff in our shop can't be easily found elsewhere in San Antonio.
We hope Geraldine's is an unpretentious, friendly place where we can all learn about wine together.
And we're still trying to source oversized inflatable cigarettes, liquor bottles and Goldfish crackers. Let us know if you have a lead.