You have toured Napa’s famed Highway 29, right? The wine trail where it takes 45 minutes to cross the road in the summer (such is the traffic)? Well, an attraction billing itself as the “#2 Wine Destination in America” is taking shape just south of Dallas. It is the “290 wine trail” or “Wine Road 290”.The term “290 wine trail” is my own. The name refers to the stretch of U.S. 290 between Fredericksburg and Johnson City.The term “Wine Road 290” is copyrighted and owned by a corporation with the following details: · Started by Gary Gilstrap from Texas Hills Vineyard in 2008, with cooperation with 8 other wineries. Now the wineries include from East to West; Texas Hills Vineyard, Hye Meadows, William Chris, Pedernales Cellars, Woodrose Winery, Hilmy Cellars, Becker Vineyards, Torre di Pietra, Grape Creek, 4.0 Cellars, Rancho Ponte, Fredericksburg Winery, and Chisholm Trail.· Wineries are eligible to be a member if they are within 5 miles of Highway 290 and within 40 miles of Fredericksburg, TX· The Texas Hill Country American Viticulture Area (AVA)· Produce at least 1,200 nine-liter cases (2,853 gallons) of wine, from grapes, per calendar year, at the facility on premise· Have wine-making equipment substantial enough to produce said volume at the facility· Be a TTB Bonded Winery· Hold a current TABC winery permit· Maintain an operating tasting room within the WR290 designation· Participate in all WR290 eventsTherefore, not all the wineries on 290 are members of “Wine Road 290”. Not all members of “Wine Road 290” front on to 290. As you drive along 290, you cannot tell which wineries are members of “Wine Road 290” from any visible insignia, you have to refer to the organization’s materials.This article is about wineries on, or near, U.S. 290, regardless of whether they are members of “Wine Road 290”For reasons that are not totally clear, this stretch of road has become the Texas wine destination of choice for Texans and on any summer weekend you can find yourself in a steady stream of wine tourists on any point of this route. It isn’t in any sense a parking lot yet, but it is clear where the trend is leading. U.S. 290 frontage land prices have gone from $7,000/acre in 2005 to some asking prices of $75,000/acre in 2014. This is where wineries want to be. Wherever they make wine, they are all setting up sales operations (usually called wineries) along the stretch roughly from the eastern city limit of Fredericksburg to the western city limit of Johnson City.Touring this area for a day or a weekend is great fun and can be a good way to get a compressed education into Texas wine. It is as though all the wineries have come to you. I thoroughly recommend it. However, I also want to advise — caveat emptor. You see, there are lots of tourist-oriented guides to the wine road 290 that essentially miss the most glaring flaw with this man-sized Disneyland — most of the wine being served does not come from Texas. In fact, you are paying for wine that does not come from Texas grapes and is not even made in Texas. It is California jug wine decorated with a Texas-themed label. Look for images of cowboys, poetry about the Hill Country, maybe a Go Texan logo on a label or two (that is likely to be, thankfully, a thing of the past, soon). It is all designed to dupe you into buying a fundamentally dishonestly labelled product. Those other guides can focus on the romance of touring through wine country. This article is about authenticity and quality.The good news is, come armed with information and you can spot these fakes right away. Here is a winery-by-winery guide evaluating them on1) Authenticity — is there product authentically labelled. Is there publicity material clear about which wines are from Texas and which are not;2) Quality — for Texas wines only, how good are they? The quality assessment is just my opinion, so feel free to trash it.How To Recognize a Texas Wine1) On the front label it has got to say Texas or a political sub-division of Texas (such as a Texas county) or a Texas American Viticultural Area (AVA) such as Texas Hill Country or Texas High Plains.2) It’s a fake if the back label contains the words (usually in very small print):For Sale In Texas OnlyI have given a full explanation here but, long-story-short, the designation For Sale In Texas Only almost invariably means a California jug wine. I have never had a good wine with this designation.What Is Wine Road 290 and How Does It Compare To The Texas Hill Country?Before we start, we should consider what wine road 290 does not pretend to be. First, it is not the Hill Country. It is just one slice of the Hill Country. If you want to visit wineries that are in the top 10% of Texas wineries then a trip along 290 will not take you to obvious representatives of that decide such as Bending Branch Winery (Comfort), Duchman Family Winery (Driftwood), Perissos Vineyards (Burnet), Sandstone Cellars (Mason), The Vineyard at Florence (Florence) or Wedding Oak (San Saba). They are all in (or near) the Hill Country but they are not (yet) selling on wine road 290.Second, wine road 290 is not U.S. 290. it is just a (fairly arbitrary) segment thereof. Thus Bell Mountain Vineyards, near U.S. 290, but not in the designated segment, are not part of the route.Third, on wine road 290 not all wineries front on to the highway. It is often (as we shall see) worth travelling the 3-5 miles off the highway to visit them.Practical Considerations•Tasting starts at around 10am on Friday and Saturday and noon on Sunday. Days start slowly down in the Hill Country, so one way to avoid Saturday crowds is to start early.•Most wineries do 40% of the week’s trade in four hours on Saturday. If you want individual attention, avoid those hours. I advise doing the route on Friday. All the wineries are fully staffed, and the crowds are absent.•All of these wineries have a fee for tasting (usually $10-12 for a flight of five or six wines). Serving sizes are about 2oz.•State law prohibits outside alcohol consumption on their premises.•Use a designated driver or a chauffeur car/limo. for the day.•Bring a cooler with ice to take purchased bottles home. Otherwise, they won’t survive the heat.•Some wineries allow outside food.•Most allow (leashed) dogs in the grounds but not inside the tasting room/visitor center.•Check the winery web site for the latest on these discretionary policies.The norm is that tasting room staff are extremely hospitable. Many of the wineries will have at least one knowledgeable member of staff available for technical wine questions.Down Wine Road 290 — With Gun and CameraWe start at Johnson City and power westwards towards Fredericksburg. It is 30 miles and six hours if we stop at every winery for 20 minutes (this is best split over two days). In the list below a couple of tasting rooms have been omitted due to insufficient data.Texas Hills Vineyards are members of Wine Road 290 (1.1 miles from Highway 290) and make wines from Texas grapes. In 2010 they made 25,000+ cases of wine from Texas grapes and will do so again when nature cooperates. Their grapes are 60% from Texas High Plains and 40% from their estate vineyard, last year all of our grapes were from the Texas Hill Country AVA.1) William Chris Vineyards. We start our tour on a high note. The wines here are 100% Texas and the vineyards you see as you drive in are producing acreage, not “show vineyards”. This is one of the young but most promising wineries in the state. As you drive in, notice the wind fan. That is a tangible indication of their determination to protect their crop against frost.Tasting sheet: All wines grape origin clearly marked;Winemaker/viticulturist/expert around to talk details: I did not see any;Special Amenities: Great grassy slopes to play on. Live music on Saturdays on the patio.Hye Meadow Winery is a startup. The tasting room looks like the sub-branch of a library2) Hye Meadow Winery: A brand new winery. Currently signing deals with Texas grape suppliers and supplementing with out of state wine. Commitment to quality and will win medals in the next few years. Recommend visiting annually to observe the evolution. I think it will be rapid.Tasting sheet: All wines grape origin clearly marked;Winemaker/viticulturist/expert around to talk details: Yes;Special Amenities: Just a tasting room right now;3) Pedernales Cellars: One of the most awarded wineries in Texas. 100% Texas fruit. This is the place to go if you want a high touch one-on-one tasting experience with an expert. Book a place ($25) in their reserve room and a Certified Sommelier (or equivalent) will take two of you through a vertical of their best wines. No crowds, no noise. You get to keep the Riedel tasting glass at the end. Nobody else on wine road 290 has this yet, although it is such a good idea I expect it to be copied.Tasting sheet: All wines grape origin clearly marked;Winemaker/viticulturist/expert around to talk details: In this case the expert is a certified sommelier on staff.Special Amenities: Great grounds. Beautiful view. Reserve Tasting Room.Woodrose Winery4) Woodrose Winery: A massive number of wines, the vast majority of which are not made from Texas fruit. The web site does not indicate any commitment to Texas fruit.Tasting sheet: Origin of the wine not marked;Winemaker/viticulturist/expert around to talk details: No.Special Amenities: Live music on patio at weekends.5) Hilmy Cellars: A new winery (since April 2012). All Hilmy Cellars are 100% Texas grapes and it is policy to keep them like that. Wines with a different label may not be Texas, but are clearly appellated and do not carry the “For Sale In Texas Only” designation.Tasting sheet: Origin of the wine marked;Winemaker/viticulturist/expert around to talk details: Yes.Special Amenities: Winery dogs snooze on the floor of the tasting room unconcerned by the large number of small children patting them.6) Becker Vineyards:Old line established Texas winery that wraps its California jug wine in Hill Country memorabilia. Look for “Texas” on the front label before buying. Their Texas wines can be good. The visitor center is very established with mature lavender and grounds surrounding the building.Tasting sheet: Origin of the wine not marked;Winemaker/viticulturist/expert around to talk details: No.Special Amenities: Live music on patio at weekends. A food truck serves food at weekends.7) Torre di Pietra: Designed to resemble a Tuscan villa. On its web site this winery describes itself as “Romance of Tuscany, Wines of Texas!”I went last year. I have visited dozens of Texas wineries. They are all unique, but this one was the only one where the tasting room staff were actually rude. On a busy Saturday afternoon, there was a backup at the station I was at, so I moved to the end of the line at an adjacent one. Out of the blue, the girl pouring at the original station screamed at full pitch to her colleague at the new one “Oy, Melinda, he’s moving around” as though I was a jailed felon cutting through the iron bars of his cell. Never again. In 2013, I did not see any Texas wine.8) Grape Creek Vineyards: A massive tasting facility. Driving up the curling road past vines either side it certainly looks the part. Immediately inside the front door is a sign listing an impressive array of medals won in prestigious out-of-state competitions. Unfortunately, most of the wine for tasting is not from Texas. Check their web site. Can you tell where any of the wines listed there actually come from?Tasting sheet: Origin of the wine not marked;Winemaker/viticulturist/expert around to talk details: No.Special Amenities: Live music on patio at weekends. A food truck serves food at weekends.9) 4.0 Cellars: 4.0 Cellars is not a winery. It is actually a visitor center for three of the best wineries in the state. Brennan Vineyards (Comanche), Lost Oak Winery (Burleson) and McPherson Cellars (Lubbock). This kind of collaboration represents a model for the future: grow your grapes in the best growing area (soil and climate); make your wine in the best wine production area (low costs and wine making infrastructure); sell it through your visitor center (where your customers are). I expect more of these to appear.Some very good wine here. These three wineries have a reputation for making Texas wine but I noticed that Lost Oak now has a line without either a vintage or a place of origin on the label. The picture depicts a cowboy on a horse. Why?Tasting sheet: Origin of the wine marked;Winemaker/viticulturist/expert around to talk details: No.Special Amenities: Live music on patio at weekends. A food truck serves food at weekends.10) Inwood Estates Vineyards: Bottle-for-bottle, these are the best wines on wine road 290. All are from Texas and the sign at the door (above) makes Inwood’s mantra transparent. Inwood Estates has been making wine in Texas for 30 years.Tasting sheet: Origin of the wine marked;Winemaker/viticulturist/expert around to talk details: Yes.Special Amenities: The only winery, to my knowledge, with a restaurant on site. Consider having lunch here or come here for an evening meal instead of going into Fredericksburg. The Italian, steak-oriented food is copacetic with Inwood’s wines. Be aware that Saturday lunchtime the restaurant is slammed.11) Mendelbaum Cellars: Not visited. Wines are a mixture of Texas and non Texas grapes.12) Alexander Vineyards: They may be the newest winery on wine road 290. The tasting room is a prefabricated home in the middle of a field. They have no wines, but big plans. They sell and taste European wines at present but, says the web site, “Plans for growing our own grapes and producing our own Texas wines are in the works”. We will check in again next year.Tasting sheet: Origin of the wine marked;Winemaker/viticulturist/expert around to talk details: Yes.Special Amenities: The window air conditioners work. Nice doggie sleeps just inside the door. Don’t tread on him as you enter.13) Messina Hof: The Fredericksburg outpost of a long-established Bryan-based winery. Slick new visitor center. Knowledgeable staff. Messina Hof can make good Texas wine but is afflicted with selling too many non Texas wines.Tasting sheet: Origin of the wine marked;Winemaker/viticulturist/expert around to talk details: Yes.Special Amenities: Did not see any.14) Rancho Ponte Vineyard: This was a bizarre experience. Another customer was being served ahead of me, so I looked around the shelves where all of the winery’s bottles were displayed. They all appeared to be non-Texas. When my turn came, I asked the gentleman pouring whether they had any Texas wines. He replied that all of the wines were Texas wines. I rephrased the question as “Do you have any wines made from grapes grown in Texas?” “Tempranillo” he said. I asked to look at the label but apparently only the NSA is allowed to see that without a court order so I politely thanked him for his time and left.Tasting sheet: Origin of the wine not marked;Winemaker/viticulturist/expert around to talk details: No.Special Amenities: None apparent;15) Coming Soon.Calais Winery. The permit bureaucrats and Council in the City of Dallas forced Benjamin Calais’ Calais Winery out of his Deep Ellum home and down to a new site on 290 near Hye. What is a loss to the people of Dallas is a gain to Hill Country tourists. He is moving the whole winery, lock stock and barrel, this summer and says that he will be open this Fall. I am predicting Spring 2015. He has made impressive Tempranillo and Roussanne and has transitioned to 100% Texas grapes from 100% non-Texas grapes in just five years of existence. An example to other newcomers.Lewis Wines: Is already established just west of Johnson City. Their wines are winning medals. They are just not open to drop-in visitors because they don’t have a tasting room yet (appointments can be made for groups). No firm date on when the planned tasting room (on a bluff adjacent to the winery) will be completed, but they should consider a sharing arrangement like 4.0 Cellars in the interim in order to get wine tourist distribution. The front page of their web site says it all “We produce wines from 100% Texas grapes.”
