Brisbane Food & Wine Trails
The best of a wine day isn't only in the glass — it's the cheese cart, the providore stop, the long lunch that runs into the afternoon. These are the food-and-wine trails near Brisbane worth following, and how to taste your way along them without driving.
Follow the Food as Much as the Wine
A great wine day feeds you as well as it pours for you. The regions near Brisbane have grown up around exactly that idea — cellar doors next to cheese makers, vineyards with their own restaurants, providores and farm gates a short hop from the tasting bar.
These are the food-and-wine trails worth following, from the graze-and-taste Gallery Walk on Mount Tamborine to the paddock-to-plate Scenic Rim. The full-day premium tour turns the best of them into one guided day — three cellar doors and a gourmet long lunch, door to door.
Four Food & Wine Trails
Mount Tamborine & Gallery Walk
~1 hr · Gold Coast hinterland
Cellar doors and craft distilleries woven together with the cafes, cheese, fudge and providores of the famous Gallery Walk. The easiest full day of food and wine within an hour of Brisbane — graze, taste and browse your way along the mountain.
Scenic Rim Paddock-to-Plate
~1–1.5 hr · South of Brisbane
True farm-to-fork country — boutique vineyards beside cheese makers, farm-gate produce and long-lunch venues that cook what's grown next door. The trail to follow when the food matters as much as the wine.
The Sirromet Long Lunch
~35 min · Mount Cotton
Queensland's most awarded winery built around a celebrated cellar-door restaurant, with Moreton Bay views. The polished choice for a half-day that centres on a long, leisurely lunch close to the city.
Granite Belt Food & Wine
~3 hr · Stanthorpe
Cool-climate cellar doors, paddock-grown produce, providores and country dining — the Granite Belt is the region's most serious food-and-wine destination, and rewards an overnight stay (see our weekend getaways).
Chasing the hinterland produce scene further north? See our Sunshine Coast food & wine day around Maleny and Montville — the foodie companion to a Brisbane wine trail.
A Full Day on the Food & Wine Trail
How a guided full-day food-and-wine trail tends to flow. Times and venues are approximate and vary by season.
- 8:30 – Door-to-door pickup from your Brisbane home or accommodation
- 9:30 – First cellar door — morning tasting of local whites, reds and sparkling
- 10:45 – Boutique winery and a craft distillery sample (gin or liqueur)
- 11:30 – Providore or cheese stop — graze on local produce
- 12:30 – Gourmet two-course long lunch at an award-winning cellar-door restaurant
- 2:15 – Final cellar door — Scenic Rim or Canungra Valley
- 3:15 – Time to buy bottles and produce to take home (carried on board)
- 3:45 – A glass of our own Cooee Wine to finish
- 5:00 – Relaxed return drive and drop-off at your door
Taste, Graze, Linger
From the Gallery Walk to a vineyard long lunch in the Scenic Rim — we'll drive the trail, time the table, and carry home whatever you can't resist.
Choose Your Wine TourFinish With a Glass of Cooee Wine
A Drop That's Ours
Every Cooee wine tour finishes with something you won't find anywhere else — a tasting of Cooee Wine, our own house label. It's how we round out the day and send you home with a memory of the country you've just explored.
Ask your guide about the story behind the label and how to take a bottle (or a case) home. On private and corporate bookings it can feature front and centre — ideal for gifting, celebrations and client days.
✦ Poured on every Cooee wine tourThe regions overlap more than the marketing suggests: several Granite Belt cellar doors serve the same producers' cheese and smallgoods you will find at the farm gates, and a number of hinterland restaurants build menus around a radius rather than a supplier list. Asking where something on the plate came from usually produces a specific answer.
The genuinely local pairing is Granite Belt Shiraz with Scenic Rim beef, both produced within a couple of hours of each other. Queensland Verdelho with Moreton Bay bugs or mud crab is the coastal equivalent.
Pairing the Food With the Wine
Carry cash for the ones that prefer it, bring a bag, and if you are buying anything that needs to stay cool, an insulated bag matters in a Queensland summer.
The ones geared for visitors — the cheese makers, the olive groves, the larger orchards — keep regular hours and are worth building a trail around. The smaller growers are best treated as a bonus if they happen to be open.
Farm gates are not shops, and turning up expecting one is the usual mistake. Many open only on weekends, some only in season, and a few operate on an honesty box.
Farm Gates and How They Work
The Scenic Rim and the Lockyer Valley behind it are among the most productive growing areas in the country — the Lockyer is often described as Australia's salad bowl. Cheese, olives, macadamias, honey and coffee are all produced within a couple of hours of Brisbane, and the Scenic Rim publishes producer trails for exactly this reason.
Strawberries are a winter crop here, peaking June to September — the opposite of the European and southern-Australian expectation. Stone fruit from the Granite Belt runs through summer, as do mangoes from further north. Apples and pears come off the Granite Belt in autumn. Citrus is a winter fruit.
A food trail is only as good as the season it runs in, and South-East Queensland's calendar surprises visitors from southern states.
What Grows Around Brisbane, and When
Frequently Asked Questions
Four stand out. Mount Tamborine pairs boutique cellar doors and distilleries with the cafes, fudge, cheese and providores of the Gallery Walk. The Scenic Rim is paddock-to-plate country — vineyards alongside farm-gate produce and long-lunch venues. Sirromet at Mount Cotton centres on a celebrated cellar-door restaurant. And the Granite Belt is serious food-and-wine country, best over a weekend.
A wine tour is mostly about the tastings; a food-and-wine trail gives the food equal billing — cheese and charcuterie boards, providore and farm-gate stops, and a proper long lunch built into the day. Our full-day premium tour is essentially a guided food-and-wine trail: three cellar doors plus a gourmet two-course long lunch at an award-winning vineyard restaurant.
On the full-day premium tour, yes — a gourmet two-course long lunch at an award-winning cellar-door restaurant is included in the $189 price, alongside three cellar-door tastings and a glass of Cooee Wine. On the half-day Wine Escape, lunch is at your own expense. On private trails we'll build the lunch venue around your group and dietary needs.
Yes — just let us know when you book. Vineyard restaurants in the region are well used to vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free and other requirements, and on private tours we'll choose a venue and menu to suit your group. The earlier you tell us, the smoother it is on the day.
They're ideal for them. Because we run our own fleet, a food-and-wine trail can carry anything from a couple up to a full coach — perfect for birthdays, hens days, team days and milestone lunches. Tell us the occasion and group size and we'll tailor the trail and the lunch. See our private & corporate tours.