The Vineyards

The Vineyards is the only restaurant hereabouts where you can get a glass of wine made from grapes grown right outside the dining room windows. Located about 30 minutes outside of San Antonio, the Vineyards is a destination restaurant for most of us, and as such it satisfies most fantasies. The drive, after leaving I-35 at the Natural Bridge Caverns exit, is a pleasant one; the restaurant, situated above a three-acre vineyard, is rustic-looking and unpretentious, and the interior even sports a pot-bellied wood stove - not of more than atmospheric interest for much of the year, but welcome the weekend of winter's last, recent gasp. The youthful serving staff belies the rural setting in both its earnestness and its sophistication, and although some of the wine information being dispensed to adjacent tables wasn't altogether accurate, neither was it totally misleading. And the same menu pitch - with all its attendant culinary terminology - was given to both the prom couple (he in tux, patent leather, and spiked hair, she in floor-length, off-the-shoulder red with judicious sequins) and an older pair celebrating an anniversary. So far, so good. -Ron Bechtol