Looking for a wine tasting, a glass of wine, a good craft beer, or a wine club membership? Or, perhaps you are searching for resort villa accommodations, a spa treatment, fine dinning, a wedding venue, or a package deal that can include all of the above. Well, it’s here at Carter Creek Winery, Resort and Spa created by owners and vintners, Jim and Dawn Carter.
Located in the heart of Texas wine country near Hye, on the region’s main artery – Route 290, Carter Creek elevates the Texas winery experiences to those found in California wine country. If you have not visited the Texas Hill Country Wineries, it is an understatement just to say that it is a quality wine producing region. The region’s wineries, Carter Creek Winery included, have won numerous high awards at national and international wine competitions. But, the Texas Hill Country has become something more, a new way to experience life.
The Carter Creek Double Gold Medal Wine Tasting
Well, belly-up in the Crater Creek tasting room, and today we are tasting two very special wines. While you are here, you are invited to look around and become immersed in Texas Hill Country life and its pleasures. Get your palate ready to taste two wines that have been awarded Double Gold Medals out of over 5,000 wines judges at the 2024 San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition. Double golds are special and only given to wines that receive gold medal recommendations from all of the judges in the tasting panel.
What makes the wines of Carter Creek so special as to receive such recognition? It is the combination of the warm growing season and minerally limestone soils in Texas that produces grapes of distinction. Those with Texas High Plains appellation also benefit from grapes exposed to warm days and cool nights at an elevation of 3,200 feet. The resultant wines with crisp acidity are earth driven; they speak of their terroir from which they come. If that wasn’t good enough, the Texas wines made at Carter Creek have benefited from veteran and highly awarded winemaker Jon McPherson, brother of longtime Texas winemaker Kim McPherson.
Take all this and pair it with the stunning ambiance of the Carter Creek Winery’s resort with remarkable results: beautiful wines and a surrounding experience that you simply cannot find elsewhere. Is your palate ready to taste?
Carter Creek Winery 2022 Plateau White Blend – This wine was crafted from a blend of Texas-grown grapes (43% Grenache Blanc, 40% Trebbiano, 12% Viognier, and 5% Picpoul Blanc) from the Texas High Plains AVA around the high plains in the Lubbock area. This interesting Mediterranean blend brings crisp acidity and a medium-bodied expression of citrus, white peach and passion fruit with additional floral notes brought by the Viognier. This highly versatile wine can be a summer sipper and still bring enough intensity to pair well with fish, fowl and fruit dishes, and pasta with cream or buttery sauces.
Carter Creek Winery 2022 Plateau Red Blend – Bringing together a trio of Italian red grape varieties (50% Sangiovese, 46% Montepulciano and 4% Dolcetto) grown in Texas, this wine highlights why Texas has become a new home for Italian grape varieties. Each of the three grapes in this wine brings a different component: Sangiovese with its tart red cherry notes, Montepulciano bringing a medium-body, plum, herbs and earth to the mix, Dolcetto, in just a dollop, brings an airy lightness to the blend. Serve this wine with pasta with red sauce, a more meaty lamb ragu, or simple burgers and pizza. It’s got you covered either way.
Background on Carter Creek Winery, Resort and Spa
On one of the Carters’ many trips from their home base in Temecula, California, they decided to explore the Texas Hill Country and visited the well-established wine trail. They fell in love with the area and decided that they wanted to build a winery and resort here. It was created in the tradition of their South Coast Winery and Carter Estate Winery resorts in California’s Temecula Wine Country.
The Carter’s Texas venture was created as a commune of Hill Country hospitality with residential-style villas, spectacular wines, craft beer, on-site spa services, and more. It gives Texas Hill Country visitors a welcoming place to stay, a wine country restaurant, and a live music venue where special occasions and great memories are created.
Enjoy!
Photo credits: Carter Creek Winery, Resort & Spa
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