Sunce Winery Tasting Room

Was part of the Russian River pinot festival and stopped in. Great stop and the entire staff was fantastic. They have several wines that are worth tasting. Definitely would go back and try some more.

After much anticipation my friend and I arrived at the Sunce Wine Crush party to eat some food, stomp some grapes, and sip some wine in the lovely sun. The price of admission 60.
For 60 dollars we were treated to a vegetarian meal which consisted of a heated packaged veggie burger someone yanked out of the freezer at Safeway, canned bean salad, and wilted Caesar salad. For those of you who don’t know, Caesar salad dressing is traditionally made with anchovies making it not vegetarian. The whole meal was obviously put together by someone who was not a vegetarian, did not know any vegetarians, nor knew that fish are not vegetables.
But really when you go to a winery I expect good wine. Most of the wines were watery rather reminiscent of sagging vinegar misted lightly with pepper. The white port was interesting in the best of all possible ways. Odd note, there was no water to rinse out the glasses when switching from a dry wine to a sweet port. So my white port had a pink tinge from the prior pour. I thought a lot before rating Sunce a One Star Wonder but I don’t think one interesting product constitutes the addition of a star.
Long lines for every event were draining, some events which were advertised did not even happen. It just seemed that the actives at the event were planned as an after thought, which makes me wonder why have the event at all.
The staff was nice and tolerate the crowds but it seemed unfair to them that they were suffering the misdirected anger of the crowd.
We did get to crush some grapes which our feet which will later be turned into wine, maybe that explained the dustiness of our tastings. Crushing grapes like an I Love Lucy episode was super sticky fun but go somewhere else to do it.

Great product at purchase.
We originally tasted Sunce’s wines at the Healdsburg square tasting room and were impressed with the wine and the very informative sommelier.
8 months later we learned we would have to relocate away from the area, so we reviewed our notes on all of the wines we had tasted. Sunce ended up in our top 5, so we revisited and bought futures, some «nows» and also joined the club.
Nearer to purchase many of the wines showed nicely.
After a couple of years, we observed a progression of corked bottles many had to be destroyed. Very disappointing.
Fast forward 4 years: I just opened one tonight which wasn’t as bad as the last 3 I opened in that the wine had not actually seeped all the way through the cork to the foil.
For «drink now», I really like Sunce and highly recommend a visit as well as returning home with some contemporary drinkers.
For a lay-​down, you may want to inquire — there are other reviews I have found online which mention the same issues with my years (2006 – 7 Cab Francs, Sauvs and Syrahs).
Happy drinking!

Oh Sunce, we only knew each other for at the most two hours and already I have a love-​hate obsession with you.
As my brother, his friend and I stupidly made our way to downtown Healdsburg, on recommendation from the kind folks at the Kendall Jackson Winery, we weren’t quite sure where we wanted to go or what we wanted to see. We knew for sure that (a) we wanted free wine, (b) we wanted to see the Bear Republic Brewery, and © we had our heads so far up our asses that we should just go somewhere and pretend like we actually chose that place instead of randomly stumbling into it.
For some reason my brother remembered the word «Sunce» in a guide we were reading for the trip, so we managed to find it tucked away slightly from the main square. Thankfully, not only were we the ONLY people there, but the tasting went until 7 and it was free of charge! Since it was already nearing 5:30, we considered ourselves fortunate and made our way inside!
Sunce wines are more sweet to the palate than others in the area, so buyer beware. There is an extensive history to Sunce’s owner, and our EXTREMELY kind and patient pourer/​server/​historian/​nice guy Fernando answered all of our questions about it. It seems that Sunce is not sold in wide commercial markets because the owner does not produce a ton of barrels per year. Which of course would explain the prices of the few wines they had to offer. Sunce’s Croatian roots (I think ‘sunce’ is Croatian for ‘sun’) are proudly displayed both in pictures in the tasting room and through the numerous tight-​knit events that are scheduled at the nearby winery itself.
After we’d gone through the standard tasting (and we even started out with two summer whites that were NOT on the list), we were treated to a wide variety of dessert wines. I can’t remember exactly when, but sometime between the blanc and the port I began to actually feel DRUNK. Off a WINE TASTING. Unbelievable! I was for sure impressed. I was already well aware that I was swaying and slurring ever so slightly, but I didn’t care — these wines were incredible and we were getting a really detailed and cool education from Fernando while we were at it!
Sunce is definitely worth checking out, especially if your taste buds meander more towards the sweet side of food and drink. If Fernando isn’t there to help you out, I have no doubt that their other employees are just as awesome and accommodating. Definitely worth mapping down on your Healdsburg/​Russian River Valley wine tasting tour!