The Den

The Den. Those are some pretty small words for a winery, but big things are happening at the extension of WineCub. Jason and Keri Hensley co-founded WineCub in November 2018. The primary focus of WineCub is to provide storage and shipping solutions in order to support and help grow the other members of the Texas wine industry.  So, the name The Den makes perfect sense for WineCub.

The winery opened in 2022 and is located in Stonewall. Caroline Bradley is the tasting room manager and I met her at the Texas Wine & Grape Growers Association (TWGGA) when The Den was just doing appointments. Now they are open for anybody to walk in and that’s what we did on a Sunday.

We found the winery through the GPS but when we got there, we weren’t sure exactly where the tasting room was. The tasting room is in the first building in front of the storage buildings, but the entrance is at the back of the building. I wonder how many times the gentleman in the front door gets walked in on.

Caroline explained how the tasting room was the original storage location until they outgrew it and built more buildings. Today WineCub has 75 clients for which they store and ship wines.

The concept for wines at The Den is to represent small wine producers who may not have a tasting room to showcase their small-batch wines. There are three tasting flights from which to select: red, white/rosé, and mixed.

We selected the red tasting because that had The Den’s own wine. These were the wines in that tasting:

• 2019 WineCub Red Wine Blend (Mourvèdre, Cinsault, Syrah, Marsanne) – Texas High Plains
• 2022 Triple D Winery Dolcetto – Texas High Plains
• 2018 Cellar Rat El Raton (Sangiovese & Petit Verdot) – Texas High Plains
• 2018 Broken Grape – Farmhouse Vineyards – Texas High Plains

The WineCub Red is the winery’s own wine, and we learned this bottle will be the last one with the WineCub label as they will be changing their labels to reference The Den.

Other wines that were available at the time of our visit were:

• 2020 Tatum Cellars Rosé (Grenache) – Salt Lick Vineyards
• 2021 Pebble Rock Cellars Sparkling Rosé (Mourvèdre) – Texas High Plains
• 2021 Grower Project Albariño – Black Water Draw Vineyard – Terry County
• 2020 Whisper Path Cellars Belle Mélange (Viognier and Roussanne) – Texas High Plains

Wines that are coming soon are:

• Tatum Cellars Syrah – Salt Lick Vineyard
• Tatum Cellars Mourvèdre

Since the winery represents other small producers, it is likely the wines available on your visit may be different. But that’s more of a reason to visit more often!