Review: Sababay Winery Tour & Tasting, East Bali

Sababay Winery is one of Bali’s top winemakers, crafting a range of award-winning wines from locally grown grapes. Their state-of-the-art winery sits on the island's east coast, around a 30 minute drive north of Sanur, and is open for daily guided tours and wine-tasting experiences in the beautiful garden.

Being wine lovers ourselves, we recently visited Sababay to take part in a tour and tasting. Below is our full experience and honest review.

About Sababay Wines

Sababay Winery was started in 2010 by Indonesian businesswoman, Mulyati Gozali. After spending time in Bali, Mulyati was upset by the poor pay and conditions of local grape farmers. She started a small winery to help empower these farmers and ensure they get paid a fair price for their fruit.

Years later, Sababay has grown into one of the largest wine producers in Indonesia. The company still works closely with local growers in northern Bali, maintaining its fair trade ethos, while utilizing European winemaking technology to produce their high-quality wines.

Their product line now includes 15 varieties of wine, ranging from entry-level Black Velvet and White Velvet to their more premium reserve series, several popular rose and sparkling wines, and even a premium port-style wine.

Sababay Distillery also produces a small selection of award-winning spirits, including grappa, vodka, and coffee liqueur.

Our Experience: Sababay Winery Tour & Tasting

While Sababay’s vineyards are located in northern Bali, their winery sits on the bay of Saba (hence the name) on the island’s east coast, around a 30 minute drive north of Sanur.

The huge, modern winery is open for daily guided tours, where you can explore behind the scenes, learn about the local winemaking process, and - of course - sample their wines.

We visited Sababay during the quiet season for their "Tour and Taste Experience" and were fortunate enough to get our own private tour of the winery.

Our knowledgeable guide first explained the history of Sababay and gave us a quick runthrough of their product range, before taking us to see the wine-making machinery and fermentation tanks.

While walking around the facility, she explained the winemaking process from the vineyard to bottling. She pointed out the state-of-the-art French processing equipment and automated Italian bottling technology.

Being a weekend, no one was working the machines. We're told you should visit on a weekday to see the winery in action. It's also much more lively around harvest time, but you'll need to contact Sababay to find out when this is!

Towards the end of the tour, we headed into the first tasting room to sample a wine from their new sparkling range.

We were given the option of the sweet Moscato de Bali or the drier Ascaro Brut. We picked the Ascaro.

Being a prosecco drinker myself, I was pleasantly surprised by the delightfully light and refreshing sparkling white wine. It might even be my new favourite local wine!

While enjoying our bubbles, our guide answered our questions and even explained how to pair Balinese wines with food.

Traditionally, most wines are paired with Western dishes. But Sababay is working to encourage people to pair their wines with popular Indonesian and Balinese dishes. Each of the bottles has food pairing recommendations on the label.

We then went back down to the main tasting room and garden area to sample 3 more generously poured glasses of Sababay wine; a white, a red, and a rose.

We were handed a simple tasting sheet and left to enjoy the wines by ourselves. A little more information about the tasting notes of these wines would have been nice, but we still enjoyed the laid-back experience.

We were also treated to some delicious cassava chips and homemade sambal. This was needed after all of the wine we'd drank!

In total, we spent 2 hours at Sababay between the winery tour and our leisurely wine tasting. The entire experience was fantastic value for money, with plenty of interesting information about winemaking in Bali and 4 generous glasses of wine.

Picnic-Style Tasting in Sababay's Garden

For an even more memorable experience, Sababay also offers premium picnic-style wine tastings in their stunning garden, surrounded by a mini vineyard.

These experiences include the same winery tour and 4 wine tastings as above. But instead of sitting in the tasting room, you can enjoy your wines at a beautifully laid picnic-style garden table with the addition of a cheese or chocolate platter or even a romantic 2-course lunch.

Premium Winery Experiences at Sababay:

• Wine Down in the Garden – includes cheese platter and rustic table set-up.

• Sip of Love – includes an artisanal chocolate platter and romantic set-up.

• Tour and Wine – includes a 2 course light lunch.

SABA Spirit Tasting

Even if wine isn't your thing, you can still visit Sababay to try their range of award-winning spirits. Produced at their in-house distillery, the spirit range features grappa, vodka, vodka infusion, and coffee liqueur.

The "SABA Experience" includes a tour of both the winery and the distillery, a tasting of SABA spirits, and a cocktail class. The experience is only available on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays at 1pm and 4pm.