Sutter Home Winery — Attraction in St. Helena

BETWEEN THE REVIEWS w/ Rodney S

Q) Rodney, while you were in Napa, did you experience any wine tastings? A) Yes, Rodney, I did! On my tight schedule, I went to a Grand Pour wine tasting at the Westin Verasa Napa, with the following day a visit to Sutter Home Winery.

Q) Were there appetizers to munch on? A) Rodney, Sutter Home had a sumptuous charcuterie spread to go along with their menagerie of wine, which included goat & sheep cheese, figs & apricots.

Q) How were the wine tastings, Rodney? A) The wine kept flowing to the visitor's content. So much so, a young woman threw up on the shuttle bus back to the hotel. I'm not really a drinker, perhaps indulging a couple times a year, so I enjoyed the sweeter libations, like their sangria & sparkling prosecco. I also had tastings of Sutter Home reserve wine, not sold in stores, such as their sangiovese.

Q) What else did you do at Sutter Home Winery? A) After helping ourselves to charcuterie & glass after glass of wine, we were entertained by a private concert in the round. Underneath a party canopy, we enjoyed the musical talents of Zach Heckendorf, Brendan James & Drake White.

A fun photobooth provided the poops & giggles

Q) Rodney, do you recommend visiting Sutter Home Winery for a tasting? A) Absolutely, Rodney! The staff were friendly & hospitable during the couple hours we spent at the winery. The grounds were beautiful to meander about in & I found a greater appreciation for wine. Although Sutter Home is considered an economy class wine, the Sutter Home Winery wine tasting was first class...

I enjoyed my visit to one of California's biggest wineries ... no problems ... but the reason I am not giving Sutter Home a high rating is because the experience felt like it was mass-market and mainstream, as opposed to a boutique or off-the-beaten path kind of experience. Sutter Home wines are so popular and commonplace that they are served on some airlines in tiny bottles. I regard their wines as some of the early wines that made California wines famous, but in my experience, people don't buy Sutter Home wines much anymore, except perhaps for big institutional or corporate users. But I gotta give Sutter Home credit for helping get this industry established and thriving in Napa Valley. The tour group I was with was given a talk in the building, and then some tastings while standing in a gift shop, and we were invited to step outside (beautiful day) to lounge on the lawn and near the old Victorian house which is adjacent to the tasting room facility. We did not see any of the other buildings or anything else on the property. The tasting room building is right up against the busy highway, detracting from any sense of natural surroundings. Everything was neat, professional, nice and normal ........

So we didnt actually have a reservation, we stopped in hoping to get a tasting before an appointment we had. We couldn't get squeezed in for a proper tasting so we got 3 full pours each for less than most wineries single tastings and went to hang out in the gazebo out back. The patio area feels like youre in a private park really, very well kept with a large grassy area for picnics, lots of flowers when the season is right im sure. I got one of the reserve reds and the white zinfandel, my wife got the port and a couple other whites. We liked the wine enough that we wanted to get some for her cousin as well, so we came back in on our way out of town and my wife had slipped a bottle of port into the box when I wasnt looking apparently it's not available anywhere but the winery and she really liked it. The hostess was awesome as well, she recognized us when we came back and we actually ended up hanging around and talking with her for a good while. We will be...