The underlying story: the long casting

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If you haven’t heard of Frasinetti Winery of Sacramento, a family-owned wine producer in the Sacramento Valley, don’t blame yourself. You probably had other things on your mind over the past 124 years.

The winery is run by the grandsons of founder James Frasinetti, Howard and Gary Frasinetti. Its location is likely considered a destination visit, rather than a walk-in visit, even though it is in Sacramento County. But you’re unlikely to walk around this mostly industrial area just outside Elk Grove, separated by rail tracks from the Siemens Mobility factory where light rail trains are assembled and repaired. If you drive there from the city center, you pass through Florin, once a thriving farming town and now a census place, then you turn onto a dirt road named after the Frasinetti family.

While at first you can half expect Rod Serling, creator and host of “The Twilight Zone,” to appear in the middle of this dark stretch, it’s only half a mile until the oasis. of the Frasinetti cellar is not looming. You make your way to a courtyard of tall trees and a series of tall, well-maintained buildings that house a restaurant, wood-paneled, well-stocked bar (this is one of the few havens for wine lovers that also serves mixed drinks) , a tasting, and enough banquet facilities to accommodate multiple simultaneous events, including an outdoor space for weddings.

There’s even a ‘secret room’ to allow surprise parties to stay that way until the last possible moment, when a Frasinetti staff member (or one of the Frasinetti brothers himself) almost separates two wine racks. floor to ceiling to reveal these are actually sliding doors that lead to another party room.

“Some people consider this place to be a sort of Winchester Mystery House,” says Gary, who, at 74, is the little brother of his partner Howard, who is 75. They have worked together for almost 50 years and seem to remain the best. friends. For siblings so close in age, they are not physically alike: Gary, a former U.S. Army drill instructor, is slender, about 5 feet, 10 inches tall, with a thick stubble of neatly cropped charcoal hair. . Howard is about 6 feet and 1 inch tall, bald and heavier, but also solidly built.

Their temperaments also offer an important distinction: Howard is a marketer and a born host. Gary is, he admits, “the most worried,” who keeps the books and sometimes has to “restrict Howard because he always has big ideas.” To a visitor, their camaraderie and dynamic yin-yang seem to be, like the perfect wine meal, a great pairing.

James Frasinetti, the brothers’ Italian immigrant grandfather, founded the winery at a time when horse-drawn wagons and railroad tracks attached to the property allowed shipping throughout California and the East Coast. As happened to many wine and alcohol bottling companies during Prohibition, which lasted from 1920 to 1933, the Frasinetti had to go out of business until the family found the niche to produce wine. altar for nearby churches and to turn its 400 acres into conventional agriculture. harvests. The winery still doesn’t retail: if you want the wine, you have to go to the tasting room to buy it.

During this interview, and strictly to aid this writer’s research, Howard pours a small glass of one of these altar wines. It has the soft lightness of a good sherry. The tasting took place in the cellar’s tasting room, which is immaculate just like every square inch of the nearly 6-acre facility, including the outdoor party area. At the time of this visit, the winery was closed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic (it reopened on April 15), but the brothers kept the tasting room ready to reopen at any time, not just resuscitate but improving its lunch and dinner service with a newly purchased pizza oven. The menu includes grilled Niman Ranch pork chops; flat iron steaks; grilled halibut; chicken cutlets; Risotto; and, in particular, Grandma Rose’s roast, the recipe of which has been in the family since Grandma Rose was on the planet, in the kitchen, making it a century ago.

Although the Frasinetti brothers weren’t optimistic about closing their business for a year, they had a serious advantage over similar businesses.

“We are 100% debt free,” Howard says.

“We paid off all the loans a long time ago,” Gary repeats. “This is how we have always tried to do things in our family.” Howard and Gary bought the winery in 1973 from their father and two brothers, who were equal partners (James died aged 92 a few years earlier).

This pay-as-you-go ethic would probably live on if there were young Frasinettis waiting to take over the cellar. But Howard says none of his children, who are 48 and 50, have expressed a desire to get into the family business. Howard also has four grandchildren, ages 12 to 25, who aren’t old enough or excited enough to carry the torch.

“We’re not actively looking for a buyer,” Howard explains, “but neither are we exactly refusing to take calls. In fact, Ken Noack of real estate firm Newmark has been listed on the property since 2018.

“It’s a tough day-to-day business,” says Gary, who has never married. The reason: “I couldn’t find someone who would have fully understood if she had scheduled me to come home for dinner at 6:45 am, then at 5:45 pm a shopper walked into the cellar and j had to deal with this. And I wanted. So I guess you can tell that I have been married in this place all these years.

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