While there is always plenty to learn, eat, drink, watch and make at Tasting Australia’s Tarntanyangga base, there are many other experiences to be had outside of the city limits.

Tarntanyangga Victoria Square will be alive with food and drink from 30 April to 9 May, but Town Square isn’t the only place to get your food fix during Tasting Australia 2021.

There is only so much time to taste the full array of excellent Australian produce on offer though, so in order to help you plan your road trip, CityMag has thoughtfully listed our pick of the events in order of drive time.

Get yourself a designated driver and venture beyond the CBD’s green belt to see what the rest of South Australia has to offer over the festival’s 10 days.

 

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Ambleside Distillers VS Animus Distillery feat. Something Wild

4:00pm – 6:00pm Saturday, 1 May
1 Ambleside Road, Hahndorf 5245
Tickets: $65.00 
Drive: 27 minutes

For the gin lover who can only make a quick trip out of the city, Ambleside Distillers is hosting a fun-filled, competitive gin-tasting day in their Hahndorf tasting bar.

Throughout this four-hour event, South Australia’s Ambleside Distillers will go up against Victoria’s Animus Distillery in a round-for-round gin-sampling competition where you will decide which of the two distilleries makes the tastier spirit.

“On the night we will put in a ballot where guests can vote on which gins they like and we can announce that at the end as sort of a fun thing,” Ambleside venue manager, Joshua Mcelhinney says.

Each round will encompass a tasting of a gin from each distillery as well as a paired canapé, prepared using local South Australian ingredients sourced from the team at Something Wild, an Indigenous-owned company supplying Indigenous produce to restaurants and consumers around Australia.

CityMag is confident the South Australian gins will come out on top, but Joshua urges people to be very specific when it comes to the gins they enjoy.

“People are brutal when it comes to gin, if they don’t like it they don’t like it and if they love it they love it,” he says.

“If people like a gin they won’t say they like another one.”

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Golding Wines Western Branch Wines & Dine Safari

10:00am – 3:30pm Saturday, 8 May
52 Western Branch Road, Lobethal 5241
Tickets: $200.00
Drive: 46 minutes

This event is an opportunity for guests to experience Golding Wines like never before, with guests taken out of the tasting rooms and into the vineyards to enjoy parts of the property they wouldn’t usually get a chance to see.

“We will walk to various locations in our western branch vineyard where we have paving platforms across our property, and at each of those we will stop and taste some wine and have a chat about the property, the family history and the blocks of grapes that we are actually in,” says Golding Wines owner, Lucy Golding.

“It’s a good opportunity for people who are interesting in the winemaking and viticultural side of things to ask a question about what happens out in the vineyard while they are tasting the wine.”

Following the walking tour, guests will be welcomed to a six-course degustation lunch, paired with matching wines, at the cellar door.

Darren and Lucy Golding suggest you pack your walking shoes and work up an appetite while treating yourself to an autumnal day of food, wine and good conversation between the vines.

“It’s nice to be able to do something like this… where we just get beyond that valley and get a really beautiful perspective over the hills and out to the east,” Lucy says.

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The Long Table

7:30pm – 10:00pm Saturday, 8 May
56 Field Street, McLaren Vale 5171
Tickets: $175.00
Drive: 47 minutes

Chalk Hill Wines, Cucina di Strada and Never Never Distilling Co. are putting on a collaborative party for Tasting Australia, which will be their first combined food, wine and cocktail experience at Chalk Hill, McLaren Vale.

“It’s very exciting because we are all separate businesses so this is an opportunity for us to showcase each of our products,” says Never Never Brand Director, Sean Baxter.

Guests will be seated on a long table for an authentic four-course Italian feast, curated by Cucina di Strada, with specially chosen Never Never gin and Chalk Hill wine pairings to accompany each course.

“It comes down to people that really understand and enjoy the authenticity. We genuinely deliver the authentic flavour that is really easy to talk about and often hard to deliver,” Sean says.

“That attention to detail, not only in the production process… but then the attention to detail in how we serve them, is what really makes Chalk Hill so special.

“The Long Table will really highlight that quality of service and that quality of product.”

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Pizza Party

12:00pm – 5:00pm Saturday, 1 May
347 Renmark Ave, Renmark 5341
Tickets: Free
Drive: 2 hours 52 minutes

Twenty Third Street Distillery has prepared an afternoon of wood-fired deliciousness, signature craft spirits and live music for their five-hour Pizza Party.

“Providing the weather is great, which it should be out in the Riverland, we will be out on the front lawn with a DJ and we will be having pizza specials and mixing up drinks in the sun,” says Twenty Third Street Distillery Venue Manager, Jessica Zimmerman.

Guests will be able to soak in the sunshine and enjoy the Twenty Third Street spirits, which Jessica says are special due to the local ingredients they source, such as citrus and even petals from local tourism destination Ruston’s Roses.

This Tasting Australia event provides a great chance to get away from the city and explore the Riverland’s stunning conservation parks, fruit stalls stocked with the best local produce and the mighty Murray River.

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Oceanview Eco Villas Kangaroo Island Producers Lunch

12:00pm – 4:00pm Sunday, 7 May
31 Point Morrison Road, Nepean Bay 5223
Tickets: $215.00
Drive: 3 hours 7 minutes

Take your Tasting Australia adventure over water for the Kangaroo Island Producers Lunch held at the beautiful Oceanview Eco Villas overlooking the spectacular coastline of Nepean Bay.

Owner of the Oceanview Eco Villas, Tamsin Wendt says the long lunch will be an intimate event where guests can take in the beauty of Kangaroo Island while enjoying a six-course meal and learning about the produce and where their food comes from.

“It’s a really interactive experience about giving people the backstory in terms of where their food has come from and also the process behind how the produce is prepared,” Tamsin says.

The event is a fine-dining experience where guests can enjoy a long lunch designed and prepared by chefs Yolandi and Dylan Pitallo, showcasing six courses worth of the best produce Kangaroo Island has to offer.

“Tim and I host the lunch, starting with a Kangaroo Island gin on arrival and then speaking with all the guests,” Tamsin says.

“The chefs get up and talk about what’s on the menu and tell the stories of where the food has come from and what they have done to prepare it for the lunch. We will have four of the producers at the lunch to talk about the produce

“It is a very small event and the chefs and producers can get up and mingle with the guests, meaning every guest who comes to the lunch gets an opportunity to speak to the people behind the food.”

This Tasting Australia event is the perfect opportunity for an extended stay to explore everything Kangaroo Island has to offer.

“South Australians often think about Kangaroo Island from a perspective of beaches and summer holidays, but if you speak to lots of the locals they’ll actually say that autumn and winter are some of the best times of year to visit,” says Tamsin.

“There is nothing better than having a bonfire and watching the beautiful sunset with a glass of wine.”

For the traveller who doesn’t have time to bask in the splendour of Kangaroo Island overnight, a charter flight has been prepared to get you from Adelaide to Kangaroo Island and then back home by the early evening.

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