Food
Cattle Drive Cafe
Todd and Vicky Verden grind the beef in house, which is the whole argument for eating here. Start with the cowboy sushi, a jalapeno popper wrapped in burger meat and bacon with a bourbon and apricot dip, and ask about Willie nuggets if you are feeling brave. Then order the Hangry Heifer: three quarters of a pound of beef under grilled onions, grilled jalapenos and bacon, with hand cut fries and onion rings alongside. Bring an appetite or bring a friend.
Coleman Olive Oil Co
Laura Taft used to work at thirty thousand feet as a flight attendant, and now she runs a tasting bar on Commercial Avenue pouring extra virgin olive oil shipped in from Tunisia. Work your way along the counter. There is a citrus habanero that will wake you up, balsamics from Italy including a peach worth taking home, and a chocolate olive oil that sounds wrong right up until you taste it.
Watson Vineyard
Stephen Watson was serving in Iraq in 2003 when he started picturing a vineyard of his own. He came home, went and got a viticulture certification at UC Davis, interned at J. Lohr, and then planted vines with his wife Mary back in Coleman County. Try the High Plains Viognier, and then the Red 1 Delta, an Italian blend that carries his old military call sign on the label. They brew their own beer too, so nobody in your party is stuck.
Black Cur Steak
Robert Williamson came out of fashion photography, and with Laurie he has quietly built a run of restaurants out here that people drive hours for, Rancho Loma among them. This is the steakhouse. Fire from oak and mesquite, antique black walnut tables, a tenderloin with roasted potatoes and pureed carrots, and before it crispy Brussels sprouts and a pull apart milk bread you will fight over. The name belongs to their late dog Rio, a black mouth cur, whose portrait hangs behind the bar.
Culture
Owl Drug Store
This place has been filling prescriptions since 1923, which makes it the oldest drugstore in Texas never to have closed its doors. Jim and Linda Caldwell bought it in 1976 and their daughter Cathy Allen runs it now. Walk past the pharmacy counter to the soda fountain, which is set into an antique bar built in 1910 and hauled down from North Carolina, and order a Coke float. It arrives made the way it was made a hundred years ago, because nobody here saw a reason to change it.
Wicked Wick Candle Co
Jasmine Speer is not making vanilla and lavender in here. The shelves carry things like Old Books and Fancy People, and Stiff Drink and a Smoke, and they smell exactly like they sound. The good part is you do not have to settle for what is on the shelf. Pick your scents, pour your own, and drive home with a candle nobody else has.
Jackalope's Golf and Games
Jennifer Hansen has the answer for a West Texas afternoon that is too hot or too wet to be outside in. Golf simulators, game simulators including a zombie dodgeball that gets competitive faster than you would expect, and a mini golf course played under blacklight. Bring the kids. Bring your mother. Somebody is going to talk trash and it will probably be her.
Outdoors
Hords Creek Lake
Ten minutes west of town the country opens up and there is a quiet lake sitting in it, run by the Army Corps of Engineers and set up properly for fishing, camping and boat ramps. Walk the shoreline, find a spot nobody is using, and if the mood takes you, wade in. It is colder than it looks. One note before you launch anything: the lake has zebra mussels, so clean, drain and dry your boat before you take it somewhere else.
