Rendering shows the upcoming Canyon Ranch Austin resort in Spicewood, Texas, which is set to open in September. The 600-acre wellness property will include the restaurant Estella, a 40,000-square-foot spa and residential homes.
Provided by Canyon Ranch
The road to Spicewood remains mostly scrub and limestone, a stretch of Central Texas that has resisted reinvention even as it continues to be sold as possibility. In September 2026, Canyon Ranch plans to open its third location here: a 600-acre wellness resort about an hour west of Austin and, according to the company, one of the largest hospitality investments Central Texas will see that year.
Founded in 1979 and often credited with shaping the modern American wellness resort, Canyon Ranch’s arrival in the Hill Country marks a significant expansion of the brand into Central Texas, pairing wellness programming with hospitality infrastructure on a scale not previously seen in the region.
Article continues below this ad
See also: The new Austin restaurants everyone will be talking about in 2026
A Michelin-starred chef leads the kitchen
Val M. Cantú, the Central Texas–born chef behind San Francisco’s two-Michelin-starred Californios, will lead Estella, the primary dining room at the forthcoming Canyon Ranch Austin, which is scheduled to open in Spicewood in September 2026.
Avinnash Vishaal/Provided by Val Cantú
The resort’s primary dining room, Estella, will be led by Val M. Cantú, the Central Texas–born chef behind San Francisco’s two-Michelin-starred Californios. When Canyon Ranch Austin opens, Estella will anchor its culinary program, offering a seasonal interpretation of Mexican cuisine shaped by Cantú’s fine-dining background and the rhythms of a closed, wellness-focused campus.
Article continues below this ad
Estella will not be open to the general public. Access will be limited to overnight resort guests and property homeowners, positioning the restaurant as a destination within a destination rather than a standalone dining room competing with Austin’s broader restaurant landscape.
See all Texas restaurants that earned a Michelin Guide star for 2025
For Cantú, whose work at Californios helped reposition Mexican cuisine within the upper tiers of American fine dining, the role is neither replication nor reinvention. He describes it instead as translation.
Article continues below this ad
“It’ll be a light version of what we do,” Cantú said. “Light, bright, fresh. Clean.”
Those boundaries are intentional. Pork belly, he noted, will not appear here, just as it does not at Californios. “That’s just not the style of food that I make.”
What diners can expect is Mexican cuisine distilled rather than dramatized: seasonal ingredients, careful sourcing and an emphasis on balance over abundance. Tortillas remain foundational. Cantú grew up in Brownwood, where his father owned a Mexican restaurant and tortilleria, and he describes masa not as a motif but as a throughline.
“When I’m making tortillas, I feel connected at a root level,” he said. “It reminds me of making tortillas with my grandmother and my dad.”
Article continues below this ad
At Californios, that grounding translated into a 16-course tasting menu that earned two Michelin stars without leaning on spectacle. Cantú is quick to downplay the accolades. “The goal was never to get to two stars,” he said. “It was to survive.”
Canyon Ranch reservations will open in March
A dish from Californios, the San Francisco restaurant led by chef Val M. Cantú, whose approach to Mexican cuisine will inform the menu at Estella.
Provided by Val Cantú
That tension — between ambition and restraint — continues to inform how Cantú approaches new dining rooms, including this one. Austin has grown more fluent in regional Mexican cooking and tasting-menu formats in recent years, but it has also been a challenging landing place for chefs whose reputations were built elsewhere.
Article continues below this ad
“Out-of-towners kind of struggle to make a connection,” Cantú said. “If you make food that’s good and people enjoy it, they connect with it.”
These 13 beloved Austin restaurants closed in 2025
The context at Canyon Ranch is different. Designed by Lake Flato, the resort is scheduled to open in September, with reservations beginning in March. The dining room overlooks a hillside of legacy oaks, and guests may arrive from fitness sessions, medical consultations or time spent at the resort’s spa.
Cantú avoids framing the food as “healthy,” a term he resists. Instead, he describes the cooking as grounded in technique and intention rather than wellness shorthand.
Article continues below this ad
Estella is one of two food outlets planned for the property. A more casual café will serve breakfast, lunch and takeaway meals, while Cantú’s influence will be most visible in the main dining room, even if his physical presence is not constant.
Many ingredients will come from local farmers and purveyors, with some grown on the property and others — particularly heirloom corn varieties — sourced through long-standing relationships in Mexico. The approach mirrors Californios’ sourcing philosophy, adjusted for guests who may dine multiple times over the course of a stay.
Cantú does not frame the project as a return meant to make a statement. “Anytime we get to go home and cook where we’re from, it always feels like a treat,” he said. Estella aims not to shock but to offer dishes that feel grounded, precise and confident.