Bent Oak Collection at Fat Ass Ranch Winery & Brewery — Attraction in Fredericksburg

My brother and his wife purchased a gift certificate from Bent Oak Winery to give to my husband and me for Christmas because they know how much we enjoy wine and frequenting wineries, which we also do with them. My brother asked if we had received the gift certificate by mail, which we hadn’t, so his wife contacted Bent Oak and Debbie Bruce emailed a replacement gift certificate to her and she emailed it to us. We forgot about the email, so this holiday season during our time off we remembered that we had received it and decided to experience Bent Oak. We ordered two bottles and some snacks. When we showed them the gift certificate, we were told it had expired and they would not honor it, even though they had received the money from my brother for it. We felt very disappointed that as a Texas small business they did not do the right thing and honor the certificate even after my husband had a private conversation (after we paid the bill) with Ms. Bruce in her office. He said to her “I just want to give you an opportunity to do the right thing” and asked if she was ok with keeping the money received for the gift certificate and not honoring it. Ms. Bruce said "yes" and my husband said "ok" and left. We always enjoy and prefer to support local small businesses, but after this experience we will not return to Bent Oak and we will share our experience with our wine enthusiast family and friends. Up to this moment, we have always taken the time to write positive reviews for businesses because we truly want local small businesses to thrive. This is the first negative review we have written for a business since it’s not in our nature to be negative, but we felt in our hearts that it was not right for Bent Oak Winery to accept money for a gift certificate and not honor it because it expired. This would have been a place we would have shared with our many wine enthusiast family and friends since it’s near our house and Chantelle, the wine ambassador, was fantastic. She educated us, which we love, on their wines, and had such a beautiful...

This was a real treat. We looked for winery that was open before 4pm. We were staying in San Antonio and wanted to visit Austin TX. We found this place by searching best wineries near Austin. When we 1st arrived, it looked like a little store front in a strip mall. When we entered it was a whole different story. We were greeted by Debbie and Bryan who both turned out to be extremely gracious hosts. They have wines grown in TX and CA. The TX grapes are grown in the High Plaines near New Mexico where it is warm during the day and cooler at night. I decided to do a tasting with only the TX wines.

The TX wine menu had 5 wines for the tasting menu. Started with the Chenon Blanc (quite nice with a buttery smoothness), proceeded to the Blanc de Bois, then the Roussanne (my least favorite), then switching to the reds starting with the Sangiovese and finally to the tempranillo. The Tempranillo was my absolute favorite.

What really made this experience so nice was the wine Ambassador Debbie. She is just the nicest person who took good care of us. She also has a very nice sense of humor. Bryan was also very nice. He helped me pick out a few stainless steel wine stoppers. Bryan gave us great restaurant suggestions for Austin and San Antonio. Do not be fooled with the entrance on the outside. It is misleading in the size and the value you receive...

So after moving here from Seattle, this was our first wine tasting place to explore. We have 20 + years of wine tasting, and been to numerous wineries. Never, have we had to reserve a time slot, and felt pressure to reserve a table! Was not a great start, confusing seat arrangements on line, and first impression was not ideal, and intimidating, but ended ok. Christine was great, and other staff “wine makers “, were helpful. My thoughts, are just open tasting to walk in people, whether they are members or not! Great atmosphere, but don’t put rules and time limits on tasting. Wine is about relaxing, enjoying life, and meeting new people. We will return,...