Hahn, Solo
In 1981, Dr. Chuck Hahn was head-hunted from his job as Director of Process Engineering at the Coors Brewery and brought to Australia charged with the task of modernising the Sydney-based Tooth’s Brewery. Soon after completing its $100 million upgrade, Tooth’s was taken over by Carlton and United Breweries—now known as the Fosters Group. The new owners didn’t require Hahn’s services.
After an unsuccessful attempt to raise funds for his own brewery in a market not yet ready for the concept of small breweries, Hahn had a stint in New Zealand before returning to Australia and opening his eponymous brewery in 1988.
Hahn says modestly the Australian beers of the time were good but he thought they could be “fine-tuned a little” to show some more interesting hop aromas. In truth, hop aroma was largely unheard of in those days.
These days, Hahn Premium Lager would barely rate a mention, but in Australia in 1988 it was something of a revelation and the small Hahn Brewery gradually developed a name for itself as a brewer of flavor-filled lagers.
But a recession in the early 90s and a repressive government excise regime made small breweries largely unviable. In 1993, brewing giant Lion Nathan took over the brewery and Hahn became their chief brewer.
Hahn was able to return to craft brewing when Lion Nathan launched their own craft beer arm, Malt Shovel Brewery, in 1998. Their James Squire range, named after the convict who is credited with the first successful hop cultivation in Australia and being the colony’s first brewer, is now one of the major forces in craft beer in Australia.
While not fitting the U.S. definition of “craft brewery,” due to being wholly owned by Lion Nathan, the brewery manages to maintain a craft beer mindset and delivers a range of excellent beers.
Hahn still looks to the United States for inspiration and tries to get to the Great American Beer Festival to judge every year and to see what is going on in the States. Calling it his “innovation research” for the year, he brings back interesting new beers for his team to sample in search of inspiration.
This process has directly led to a number of their specialty and seasonal beers, including the limited release Hop Thief Ale, an American-style pale ale; Rum Rebellion Porter, a well-balanced porter fermented with oak chips with a portion aged in rum barrels; and Golden Ale, an English-style summer ale hopped with Amarillo.
The importance of the Hahn-run Malt Shovel brewery is that it manages to walk that fine line between keeping a big brewery’s accountants happy and the country’s growing ranks of beer enthusiasts satisfied.
Hahn acknowledges this balancing act, describing it as a “tightrope walk between drinkability and flavor deliverance,” but he points out that at the end of the day, it is business.
“Small breweries are famous for two things: making great beers and going out of business,” he says when asked about his brewery’s broad appeal. “You have to have beers that you can sell enough of to pay for the beers that you can’t sell enough of.”
And in Australia, we have seen many great breweries come and go.
