The Mandola Estate Winery

Mandola Estate Winery
13308 FM 150 W
Driftwood, TX 78619-9274
(512) 858-1470

Founded in 2005 by Houston wine connoisseurs Drs. Stan and Lisa Duchman and inspired by their travels to Europe, the Mandola Estate Winery in Driftwood, Texas (about 20 miles southwest of Austin in the Texas Hill Country) recreates a small corner of Italy, where native Italian grape varieties — Pinot Grigio, Vermentino, Moscato, and Sangiovese — flourish together with the great grapes of France and California. The wines of the Mandola Estate Winery represent some of the best wines to be produced in Texas today: hand-crafted wines vinified in a state-of-the-art winery in the Texas Hill Country.

Wine has been made in Texas since the arrival of the Conquistadores in the sixteenth century and wine has always been a part of Texan culture. Few remember today that it was rootstock sent from the vineyards of Texas in the late nineteenth century that were used to repopulate the vineyards of Europe that had been decimated by the scourge of phylloxera.

When they decided to build a winery in the one of the most picturesque landscapes of the Texas Hill Country, the founders of the Mandola Estate Winery were inspired by their trips to Europe and, in particular, to their visits to Italy, where native Italian grape varieties are used to make food-friendly wines, wines with gentler alcohol content and less bitterness, wines with natural fruit flavors and aromas that make for the perfect accompaniment to a wide variety of dishes. After all, they learned in Italy, wine is an essential part of the healthy Mediterranean diet. As one Italian chef told them, he would never serve wine without food and never serve food without wine!

And so they decided to plant Italian native grape varieties, together with the popular international varieties that have enjoyed such success in the United States (Zinfandel, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, and Chardonnay).

The planted grapes like Pinot Grigio, the Italian Pinot Gris, a red grape in a white skin, that makes for rich white wine with intense white stone fruit flavor and structure.

The planted grapes like Vermentino, the quintessential grape of the Italian riviera and the island of Sardinia, where warm Mediterranean climate (not unlike that of Texas) helps winemakers to grow fresh, crisp wines with bright fruit and citrus flavor.

And they planted grapes like Sangiovese, the Italian red grape par excellence, used to make a wide variety of Italian wines, from the famed Brunello di Montalcino (known for its rich tannic structure and its remarkable aging potential) to the food-friendly, light-bodied reds of Chianti Classico and Chianti Rufina.

Today, the winemakers at the Mandola Estate Winery use state-of-the-art winemaking technology to produce what has been called “the best wine in Texas.”

The founders of the Mandola Estate Winery encourage you to come visit us: the winemaking facility was designed especially so as to allow for visits at any time during the winemaking process without any risk of compromising our high sanitary standards.