According to Texas Proud, Texas is simply a bit larger than France. Across the state’s large plains, hills, and valleys, lots of red wine grapes grow from cool-climate to warm-weather ranges with origins in Europe and America.
Susan Auler says that the Texas Hill Country “provides a limitless variety of exceptionally intricate, mineral-rich soils, limestone, sandstone, and granitic hills. These soils are well matched for growing the greatest quality red wines. We believe that the Texas Hill Nation is among the ideal areas for choosing specific websites for specific grape varietals.”
When Fall Creek Vineyards started, the focus was on standard French ranges from Bordeaux and Burgundy. However, in more current years, under the guidance of Chilean-born winemaker Sergio Cuadra, they now work with more warm environment grapes like tempranillo and mourvedre. Red wine critic James Suckling stated the 2016 Fall Creek ExTerra Tempranillo was an “outstanding American red wine.” Auler says, “A lot of excellent wine grapes will succeed in Texas once they are matched to the best site.”
Wine Industry Consultant’s “A lot of Inspiring Wine maker 2021,” Kim McPherson, believes Rhone, Spanish, and Italian varieties, like sangiovese, tempranillo, mourvedre, and so on, are the best for Texas. The Locations TX winemaker shares with Andrew Chalk that whatever can grow in the Texas High Plains, and vintners will plant the grapes a wine maker requests. However, they may not be the very best suited for the environment. McPherson tells Market See that cool-weather ranges, like riesling and cabernet, do not make the best Texas red wine.