A foundational Peninsula producer best known for pinot gris, friulano, and a cellar door with real local soul.
Known for Kathleen Quealy Pioneer ProducerPinot Gris and Friulano ProgramPobblebonk LabelHalliday 95-Point Winery
Photo · Peninsula Insider
Why we’d goQuealy helped teach the Peninsula what it could grow beyond pinot and chardonnay, the cellar door still carries that experimental, unpretentious spirit.
Quealy is important not because it is flashy, but because it helped teach the Peninsula what it could grow. Kathleen Quealy and Kevin McCarthy were early believers in alternative Italian varieties here, and the cellar door still feels grounded in that experimental, quietly pioneering spirit.
The wines are distinctive, food-friendly, and often better value than the region's higher-profile labels. The Pobblebonk pinot gris is the place to start. This is where locals send friends who say they want to understand the Peninsula rather than just photograph it.
Stop in before lunch nearby and buy a mixed six on the way out. Balnarring is slightly off the main wine trail, which is half the point.
Worth knowing
If you only do one thing
Taste the Pobblebonk before you buy anything else, it's the clearest expression of what Quealy does differently.
Works well with
Hurley Vineyard · Balnarring Bakehouse
Filed under Cellar DoorSlowGardenSpringSummerAutumnAll YearLocalsCouplesFirst Timers
Not sure how to build a day around Quealy Winemakers?
Ask The InsiderIn the journal
These pieces give you the context a listing page never does — the when, the why, and the who-it’s-for.
2 May 2026
If you care about how the Mornington Peninsula became more than a pinot monoculture, start here. Quealy is not glossy and that is exactly the point — this is one of the region's formative tasting rooms, built on curiosity, Italian varieties, and a refusal to behave like a tourist estate.
6 April 2026
Not the biggest estates, not the flashiest rooms. The five Peninsula cellar doors where the wines - and the people pouring them - actually change how you think about the region.
9 April 2026
If you've booked a villa with a kitchen, you've booked one of the great food sourcing weekends in Victoria. Here is the shopping circuit - market first, bakery second, wine last - that actually does the region justice.
Nearby picks
3050 Frankston-Flinders Rd, Balnarring VIC 3926 · $
The village bakehouse for the Balnarring side of the Peninsula, pies, pastries, and the breakfast sandwich that fuels the Saturday market crowd.
Frankston-Flinders Rd, Balnarring VIC 3926 · $
A relaxed village-scale monthly market on the Balnarring Village Green, local produce, makers, and the Peninsula's most family-friendly market morning.
3050 Frankston-Flinders Rd, Balnarring VIC 3926 · $$
A proper country pub in the middle of Balnarring village, open fires in winter, a shaded beer garden, and honest counter meals.
Build a day around this
Peninsula Insider guides that put this stop into the context of a full day or weekend.
Where to eat