What the locals are loving: Bass & Flinders Distillery

Found seaside ingredients and a base of local grapes inject unique flavours to the handcrafted gins of Mornington Peninsula’s Bass & Flinders. 

Foraging around wild Mornington Peninsula beaches for sea kelp, saltbush and samphire is all part of a day’s work for Daniel Calvert. “It’s really great,” says Bass & Flinders’ distillery production manager. “You get down to the beach when the wind is right and there have been some heavy swells, and the kelp we target washes up to shore. Sometimes you feel a bit like an ibis but it’s very rewarding.”

Bass & Flinders became the first distillery to call this renowned Victorian cool climate wine region home when it opened in 2009. Initially focusing on brandy, it evolved to encompass gin as well, with limoncello and liqueurs playing back-up. (Explains Dan of the shift: “Brandy has to spend two years in barrel, so it was a natural progression.”)

The family-run distillery’s difference lies in the meticulously handcrafted process, which begins, says Dan, with the base spirit – “eau de vie”. Meaning “water of life”, the base is made from grapes and serves as the foundation for Bass & Flinders’ entire product range, infusing it with local flavour. “Most gin distilleries buy in their base spirit, and some make their own grain spirit, but grape is less common – it’s our true house style,” he says. “You get seasonal variations based on the shiraz grapes we use from a single Peninsula vineyard.” For example, a cooler season might have more white pepper than black pepper or the fruit profile might be different. “In that way, it’s almost like another botanical than just a neutral spirit,” explains Dan, “and we slightly change our botanicals to suit the variations in the eau de vie each year.”