Pick a wine and serve it yourself at this unique, new SLO County tasting room
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- The Optimyst in Cambria offers self-serve red-wine tasting, sample other wines & beers.
- Shop pours rare estate wines by taste or glass, with bottles available for purchase.
- Wine-and-beer tasting, build-your-own charcuterie and community seating by fireplace.
At the heart of a cozy new Cambria social club for wine and beer tastings is a high-tech, wine-serving system that, for the imaginative, could conjure up memories of childhood soda fountains.
“Sometimes, we call it the adult candy store,” said a chuckling Bob McCandless, co-owner of The Optimyst with his wife, Cari McCandless.
It’s a classy shop that offers wine enthusiasts the chance to taste some high-end red wines that are rarely offered for sample sips, sometimes even at the wineries that make them.
“We have automated pouring from wine-preservation machines that make it possible for us to serve wine by the taste, the half-glass or full glass,” Bob McCandless said.
Customers can also buy full, unopened bottles.
It’s a fairly unique experience that soft-opened in September.
“We tailored the business to be different from other tasting rooms on the Central Coast,” he said.
How does it work?
The computerized tasting system lets The Optimyst preserve the freshness of red wines in opened bottles visible inside a glass case, because they’re automatically sealed with argon gas. That non-toxic insulator is frequently used between the panes of glass in multi-pane windows.
The shop’s frequently rotated offerings include quite a few pricey estate wines that normally aren’t available for tasting, not even at the winery that makes them, McCandless said.
Those higher-cost wines consistently outsell the medium- and lower-cost vintages every time at The Optimyst, he said, whether in the shop or from their online store.
Cost for a taste ranges from a couple of bucks to as much as $55 or so. Prices per bottle span from about $20 each to several hundred dollars.
White, rosé, sparkling wines and French champagnes are hand poured, McCandless said, as are the beers.
“We are proud to offer some of the finest wines and craft beers that are the gems of the Central Coast,” he said. “All of our beers are extremely fresh and local.”
McCandless and his co-owner wife Cari McCandless curate their ever-changing selection of small-batch brews from Central Coast breweries.
How to sample the red wines
So how does it work?
A customer walks through the comfy, community seating areas, including one by a fireplace, and gives a server their contact and credit-card information. That information is transferred to a “tab card,” an upscaled, computerized version of old-style bar tabs.
The customer chooses a red wine (a taste, half glass or whole glass) at the dispenser, housed in cabinets McCandless built. Each cabinet holds four computerized dispensers and a rack below to store the wines dispensed above.
From there, it’s simple: Insert the tab card, the wine is dispensed, and the system keeps track of the expenditure.
The seating area includes tables for two or four, plus a long bar at which servers hand-pour the other wines and beer.
The Optimyst seeks to feed the soul and the body
To round out the shop’s offerings, they also serve “build it yourself” charcuterie platters, McCandless said.
For their grazing assortment, customers can choose between different types of cheeses, meats and crackers that the couple carefully select to pair well with The Optimyst’s beverages.
That helps create what many area visitors have told the couple is a “great first stop,” he said.
The new patrons can socialize with visitors and locals, plot out their visit to the North Coast and taste a wide variety of estate wines and local beers, with the latter drawn from six taps.
Lots of locals have made The Optimyst a regular stop, McCandless said. “We’re very grateful for all their support.”
The Optimyst’s building history starts in the 1930s
The small, salmon-colored stucco home that houses The Optimyst is down the block and across the street from the popular Robin’s restaurant on Burton Drive in Cambria’s East Village.
George Loorz, who oversaw the construction of Hearst Castle, built the structure in 1939 for the home’s first owners, dairy ranchers Angelo and Katina “Mary” Bonomi from Italy. They sold the property in the early 1990s.
Since then, it has housed a variety of enterprises, among them being The Green Room,” Lesta Travis’ Pacific West Art Gallery and, most recently, the Velo Cambria electric bike shop.
In creating The Optimyst, the McCandlesses fulfilled a dream of the most recent occupant, Rich Wintard and his Velo Cambria.
When he closed the bike shop in July 2024, he told The Tribune he’d upgraded the patio and made other changes to accommodate his plans for a wine bar with live music.
Now, it’s a reality. And The Optimyst will feature live music in an indoor nook or on the patio when the weather and other factors allow, Bob McCandless said.
The two California natives capitalize on her upbringing
Cari McCandless’ father Doug Wilks was a hobbyist winemaker in Chino Hils for four decades. His small, home winery was named Coyote Hills Wines.
The McCandless couple left Huntington Beach for Cambria about four years ago, after years of working in the technology space, he said. “Our last company there was a coworking space named The Dock HB.”
When the industry took a beating during the COVID-19 pandemic, they sold their properties and headed north, Bob McCandless said.
“Being longtime aficionados of the great wines of the Central Coast, we spent the first few years exploring the many wineries of the area and got to know several of the local winemakers,” he said.
Seeing the passion those pros put into their craft and creations set the stage for the couple’s next business.
“We thought it would be a great idea to create a central hub in Cambria where people could come to taste and learn about our local wines and winemakers,” he said. “The hope is to drive a deeper understanding and appreciation of how incredible and unique our area is for winemaking.”
Meanwhile, their friend Guy Bahringer introduced them to “the wonderful craft beer makers from our area, McCandless said. “We immediately saw a similarity with our winery partners and decided to add them to our offerings.”
Details about The Optimyst
The wine/beer tasting shop is open at 4056 Burton Drive from 2 to 9 p.m. daily.
For details, call 805-203-5065 or visit their their Facebook or Instagram sites. McCandless said he was working on all the social media sites on Thursday, including new websites for the store and their clubs.
This story was originally published November 24, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
