Our guide to the best Barossa Valley wineries and cellar doors

Hentley Farm is a place where the distance between vineyards, kitchen and table is small, and everything tastes better for it. Tastings happen in a small stone cottage by Greenock Creek, where the walls are thick and the ceilings low. You might try their signature shiraz, or a viognier that’s become a hot favourite among regulars. If you’ve booked into the restaurant for lunch, you’ll pass the kitchen garden on your way through — raised beds of herbs and leaves nodding in the breeze, maybe a chef bent over picking them for service. The menu follows what’s ready to harvest, and the wines are chosen to suit. 

At Tscharke (pronounced ‘sharkie’), nothing is surface level — not the winemaking, and definitely not the cellar. On the sun-drenched slopes of the Barossa’s Western Ridge, this estate has gone underground to give wine lovers a closer look at what goes into every bottle. Step into the subterranean cellar and you’re met with cool stone walls and barrels exhaling the scent of oak and age. Tastings in the cellar are by appointment only — though you can visit the above-ground cellar door from Monday to Saturday — giving you time to walk the cool corridors and hear how each wine came to be.

Eight winemakers, one shared table.  Artisans of Barossa is less a cellar door and more a collective conversation. Here, independent makers pour their wines side by side, each one a different expression of the region. You start to see how the soil, season and the smallest decisions in the winery all leave their mark in your glass.

Order a flight and start exploring. Ask about the Grenache Project — one vineyard, one vintage, six different winemakers — and see how a single grape can tell six very different stories. It’s a rare chance to taste the Barossa not as a monolith, but as a patchwork of people, places and perspectives.

At Murray Street Vineyards, you’ll taste the wine just metres from where it’s made — fermenters ticking behind corrugated walls, amphora tucked in cool corners, oak barrels stacked and breathing quietly. Out front, wisteria winds its way along the verandah, casting soft shade over long tables. Someone brings a flight — shiraz, grenache, maybe that pale rosé everyone talks about — and leaves you to get acquainted.

You break bread, slice cheese, lean back in your chair as the view rolls out beyond the vines. This is a place to let the wine speak and the afternoon stretch out.

On the western edge of the Barossa, Alkina is digging deep into what makes a wine truly belong to its place. Certified organic and biodynamic, the vineyards are mapped down to tiny pockets of limestone, clay and fractured rock. Each one is picked and fermented on its own, letting the character of the land come through in every batch. You’ll taste that detail in the Kin range, with bright textural wines that each have their own personality. For something more layered, try Wild Earth, Night Sky or Birdsong. These bold reds feature artwork by Adnyamathanha artist Damien Coulthard, whose paintings — displayed in the tasting room — are inspired by the stories and Country beneath the vines.

Step inside this 1800s ironstone cottage and it won’t take long before you feel like one of the family. The Kies family has been here for six generations, and you’ll still find them behind the bar, out in the vines or firing up the café kitchen, each adding their touch to the place they call home.

Wander in for a tasting and you might start with a crisp rosé that smells like spring mornings, or a bold red that lingers like good conversation. If you’ve got the time, join winemaker Bronson for a walk through the winery — past stainless steel tanks and the sweet, earthy scent of fermenting grapes — or settle in next door at the Monkey Nut Café for a long lunch and a pot of Tina’s favourite tea. This is Barossa hospitality at its best.