Sandstone Cellars Winery

3 Dec 2011

(map) For a tiny winery in the sleepy-but-cute town of Mason, Sandstone is making a big impact. Robert Parker’s Wine Buyer’s Guide mentions only six Texas wineries, and guess who’s one of them? Yep. They were also just featured here in Edible Austin’s holiday gift guide. Sandstone is unique in that they use not just Texas grapes, but only grapes grown in Mason County. They produce a mere 500 cases a year, creative blends of tempranillo, syrah, mourvedre, and a Portuguese grape called Touriga. (For fancy wine-tasting notes, go to Russ Kane’s Vintage Texas wine blog here.) Stop by on a weekend to try some and you just might be lucky enough to meet the winemaker.

Creative genius and winemaker Don Pullum has been working with Sandstone for six years. He just happened to stop in to see how his latest wines were developing. He seemed pretty happy with what he was tasting. So were we!

Co-owner Manny is a cool guy who loves the town of Mason, loves art and loves wine. In addition to his own, he features a lot of other Texas wines which he personally likes.

The shop is in a former house that’s basically one cozy room. In addition to wine, you can buy art: prints, sculptures, pottery. The Sandstone label is a reprint of one of artist Bill Worrell’s paintings that hangs in the shop.

Where the magic happens. The fermentation tank – as in the one and only – is in the back of the shop. Note the upcoming blend – the mourvedre harvest was supposed to be particularly good this year.

Next door, Sandstone has a wine bar selling wines by the glass and local foods, like cheese plates. In good weather, there’s live music on the porch. In bad weather, there’s wine!

Sandstone Cellars Winery website