The Nazaaray Estate Winery is a micro boutique winery in Australia. It is arguably one of the smallest and southern-most vineyards on the Mornington Peninsula. The Mornington Peninsula is one of Australia’s premier cool climate wine regions. Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, the two classic Burgundian varieties, are planted on a gentle north facing slope that sits around 750 feet above sea level and about 3 kilometres inland from the ocean. Most of the vine rows run north-south to get maximum exposure to the sun. In keeping with our philosophy of creating a natural environment we have planted over 2500 trees - mostly Australian natives - as wind-break protection for the vines and to encourage the local fauna.

Meaning of the word:

Nazaaray in Indian means beautiful visions sometimes the sort that you see after having a few glasses of our wine!! In East Europe the words "Nazdravlje" or "nazdraviye" mean good health or heaven.

The Logo

The lady with the falcon is from a Rajasthani miniature. We chose this to represent our Indian heritage and the refined taste of our premium wines produced here in Flinders.

Winemaker: Paramdeep (Param) Ghumman.

Our Region

Victoria – Australia’s garden state has a burgeoning wine industry. The Mornington Peninsula, Westernport / Hinterland region is a rural region of rolling hillsides, small villages and spectacular sea views, vineyards, orchards pastures and over 60 cellar doors. The Mornington Peninsula extends south into the treacherous waters of the Bass Strait dividing the water into the protected Port Philip Bay and Oceanic Westernport Bay which blesses our valley with some of the coolest climate on the Mornington Peninsula.

The Vineyard

The site is 160 metres above sea level and about four kilometres inland from the nearest shoreline. The vines are largely placed in rows running North South. In 2007 Paramdeep decided to focus on quality all the way- after all terroir / the vineyard is where 90% of the wine characteristics develop and so all fruit is grown onsite. Merlot and chardonnay have been deleted from our repertoire of wines in favour of a wider clonal variety of pinot noir and cool climate Shiraz to make the blended end product more complex, tantalising and distinctive wines with a strong sense of place of origin (check also our Pinot Gris and Sauvignon blanc).

Winemaking Philosophy:

Our main desire is to capture and present in our wines the truly unique Australian flavours and character of this small pocket of small rolling hills. Our practical focus is quality not quantity. The strategy is to use traditional Burgundian wine-making methods, (for example low yields per vine, open vat fermentation) to produce wine that best represents the meso-climate of Greens Bush on the western side of the vineyard and the ocean to the south. Family and friends gather to hand pick the grapes and help to process the fruit into fermentation vats while Paramdeep personally handles all wine handling procedures. Minimal intervention is practiced in facilitating the natural miracle of wine, while employing knowledge of fermentation science only to avoid any reduction of quality. All our wine has been made and bottled on our estate.

The vines are spur pruned by hand such that yields are reduced and the resultant fruit flavour is highly concentrated. We rigorously hand select the low cropping vines. The relatively high rainfall in the area and the deep soil make irrigation unnecessary and this accentuates the intense fruit flavours.

We use traditional natural fermentation with wild yeasts.

Winemaking at Nazaaray

Winemaking has been documented as far back as 4000 years. It is documented in India back in the early Aryan times around 3000 BC. Good wine making is about taste and timing. Yeast ferments the sugar in ripe grapes to alcohol. Wine drinkers want clear wine (looks good) with a good aroma (smells good) and a good palate (tastes good).

To make good wine you want to start with the right grapes- right variety, nicely formed disease free bunches. The grapes should be picked at just the right time (some times staggered over several days as different patches mature at different times). The picking time is determined by the balance between acid and sugar reached in the grape berries. Handpicking ensures stalks and leaves are left out and bruising of the grape berries is avoided - problems that are common with machine picked grapes.

White wine - a wine press squeezes out the juice and then the wine is left to ferment in large steel tanks. White wine is fermented without the skin since the skins make the wine taste bitter.

Red wine - gets more flavour and colour from skin contact. Being a small boutique winery our reds are gently basket pressed. (Basket pressing is a manual operation that is still practised in Burgundy in France.) Since the pips are not crushed during the process our wines are low in tannins (the taste of strong black tea) .They are left to ferment in large vats and then a few days later the juice is pressed out and put into oak barrels to ferment over the next few months.Ripe fruit flavours. We use natural wine making.

New wine barrels are imported from France and America. These are toasted by a cooper to the requirements of the winemaker. To ensured sustainable oak forestry the French government has restricted barrel manufacturing to being made only from 100 to 200 years old trees. This limits the number of barrels made per year and since demand outstrips supply they are expensive.

Additives: Often in cooler climates it is harder to get the grapes to ripen to the level of sugar required. In Europe often sugar is added to the grape juice before fermentation. In warmer regions of Australia due to early ripening the sugar concentrations tend to be high but not the acidity - so often acid is added as tartaric acid- which is a permissible additive. We at Nazaaray are fortunate enough to often not require the addition of either sugar (Is not allowed in Australia) or acid.