Nashik

The Nashik district administration dates the start of the table-grape boom to 1925 at Ojhar, near Nashik, under Raosaheb Jairam Krishna Gaikwad; the GI file records grapes in Nashik since the 1950s, citing the district gazetteer. In 1987 Madhavrao More started the Pimpane co-operative winery with the French firm Harbault & Fils to make sparkling wine and planted Chardonnay and Pinot Noir; it made 500,000 bottles and exported 35,000 to France before stopping after the 2003 harvest.

In 1997 Rajeev Samant planted Chenin Blanc, Sauvignon Blanc and Zinfandel, working with the Californian winemaker Kerry Damskey, and launched Sula's first wine in March 2000; contract growers founded Vinsura in 2002. The GI was filed on 22 April 2008 as 'Dindori Wine', renamed Nashik Valley Wine in 2009 and certified on 4 August 2010. The district page names harvest-season wine festivals such as SulaFest.

The GI places the area between 19°10′ and 20°53′N and 73°16′ and 75°6′E, at 2,000–2,400 ft (about 610–730 m), and describes a temperature inversion: warm days and cooler nights. Vines are pruned back in March–April, after harvest, which keeps them dormant through the hottest part of the year, and pruned again in September–October for the crop, which ripens from October to March. Days then average about 25 °C and nights can fall to 8 °C. Soils in the north of the district are described as red laterite; growers plant on hill slopes and crumbly laterite and keep slopes so roots are not waterlogged in the monsoon, from June to September, when irrigation stops. In the ICAR zoning, Nashik lies in the hot tropical grape zone.

The application credits the altitude with high acidity in the grapes, balanced by ripeness, and says warm afternoons raise sugar while the evening chill, to about 7 °C, keeps subtler flavours. It describes the white wines as rich, fruity and concentrated, pale lemon-green when young and deepening to gold, and the reds as rich and structured, dark purple when young and turning ruby to brick with age. It cites ratings by the taster Steven Spurrier of 13–17 points out of 20 for most wines tasted. Because the specification leaves the choice of variety open and grades wines by market price, the GI marks provenance rather than one style.

Nashik Valley Wine (application 123, Class 33) is registered to the National Horticulture Board and the Nashik Valley Wine Producers Association and is valid to 21 April 2028. The wine must take at least 80% of its fruit from Nashik district and be vinified and bottled in the region by a winery based there. Yields are limited to 8 tonnes per acre (about 20 t/ha), harvest is by hand, and no spray may be applied in the 45 days before harvest. Permitted grapes include Chenin Blanc, Sauvignon Blanc, Zinfandel, Cabernet Sauvignon, Shiraz, Chardonnay, Merlot, Riesling, Viognier, Tempranillo, Malbec and Thompson Seedless. Alcohol must be 10–14.5% for whites and 12–14.5% for reds; the method section describes at least six months in barrel for reds. One authorised user is registered, and the district page counts 22 wineries in Nashik.