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Healdsburg Wineries

Sausal Winery

7370 Hwy. 128, Healdsburg (Sonoma County), California; Tel. 707.433.5136

Sausal Winery is the kind of quintessential family-run operation that's been in the business for generations, creating simple, everyday wine for simple, everyday folks. It's a nice, off-the-beaten path detour that harks back to a long-lost time when wines were made for family and friends--not mass produced for an international palate.

Stick with what Sausal does best: Zinfandel. The nonvintage Cellar Cats Red ($12) is an agreeable picnic sort of wine dedicated to the tasting room's beloved felines. Most of the other Zinfandels we tasted, mostly '02 vintages ranging from ($18 to $26), were all a bit tight, but they had nice characteristics of mineral and briar that made for approachable, if not always outstanding, wines.

The family's patriarch, Abele Ferrari, held the patents to a number of winemaking machines, including a stem crusher he manufactured in Healdsburg (Sonoma County), California You can see diagrams and copies of the patents in the tasting room. -- Heather Irwin

Sausal Winery. 7370 Hwy. 128, Healdsburg (Sonoma County), California; Tel. 707.433.5136. Open daily, 10am-4pm. Regular tastings are free.