Bottega - A Restaurant that Lives Up to the hype!

Yes, we finally ate - with a lunchtime reservation, no less - at a Napa Valley restaurant that actually lives up to its hype. The new-as-of-last-year Bottega, set in charming and starred-restaurant-full Yountville, had as splendid a repast as I have ever eaten. Bottega is a small restaurant in the middle of a large Inn setting and focuses, I believe, on mostly Northern Italian specialities. It was a lot of fun for husband G and I to dress up, as we hadn't been on a "date-date" in some time. We ate there at lunch because it's a tiny bit cheaper - and you can get away with not ordering wine and dessert without looking crazy. There were people dressed up in designer outfits and people in t-shirts and jeans. I was happy I'd worn a dress.
My husband G had a divine pasta dish topped with fresh ricotta and swimming in roasted rabbit and chanterelle mushrooms in a kind of red wine sauce. Really very good. However, my dish was so much better! It was perfect, perfect browned ricotta gnocchi with delicious juicy duck, roasted chestnuts and butternut squash. And the chef (Michael Chiarello) came up afterwards, not usual with a "celebrity chef" restaurant, and asked me how everything was, and I told him truthfully I'd just had the best gnocchi I'd ever eaten, and that includes trips to Italian restaurants in New York City and the south of France. The funniest part of the meal was that we were seated at a table between what appeared to be two aging blonde socialites discussing plastic surgery and what appeared to be a some sort of crime-syndicate couple (very Sopranos, but upscale!) So we spent a lot of time telling each other how delicious our food was, and also eavesdropping. And one of the socialites said to the other, "This place is expensive, but not expensive for Napa Valley!" Which I have to say, I agree with. My pasta was around $16 - and worth every freaking penny! Next time, though, I want to try the confit de canard with moutarda di fruitta. (I think I just mixed my French and very poor Italian spelling there.) I could only finish half of my pasta dish - I imagine I'll only be able to get through one quarter of an entree!
Here's a link to their dinner menu:
http://www.botteganapavalley.com/dinner.html
The service wasn't super attentive, except for a very friendly desk hostess and maitre-d - it was packed full when we were there, we couldn't get a drink refill, but maybe it's like that all the time? The waitress did know how to answer questions about the menu, and steered us accordingly to our delicious lunches, although she didn't visit us much during the lunch (see lack of drink refill opportunities.) Though it was cold outside (in the fifties) the restaurant was about a billion degrees - so dress accordingly!
Anyway, it gets two thumbs up from us! Finally, a place in Napa Valley that didn't make us long for (gulp) Seattle's dining scene!