Matilda Bay in Fremantle is one of the earliest craft breweries in the country. It’s best known for Dogbolter, a malty beer with roasted grain and chocolate notes, and a Bavarian-style wheat beer, Redback, with a pronounced banana and cloves character. It’s named after a poisonous spider, so beware.
On the other side of the country, Bridge End Brewery in Beechworth, Victoria, responds to the interest in Belgian styles with a Chevalier Saison, a fruity and spicy beer, along with Robust Porter with a big roast and chocolate character balanced by peppery hops, and―flying the flag―Australian Ale, a fruity, cloudy ale with good hop bitterness.
The Redoak boutique beer café in Sydney is run by brother and sister duo David and Janet Hollyoak. They have an eclectic range including a Belgian-inspired raspberry beer, Framboise Froment, and IPA, which is served on hand-pump in the café, and has a big citrus fruit and bitter hop character. Their Rauch or smoke beer uses malt from Bamberg in Germany, with toffee notes, spicy hops and a long, smoky, complex finish.
Variety in Victoria
At the conclusion of Beer Expo, I went on a rapid and exhilarating tour of breweries in Melbourne and Victoria state. Three Ravens is in the up-market residential Thornbury area of the city, the brainchild of brewer Marcus Cox and partners Matt Inchley and Ben Pattison. They supply cask-conditioned beer to one local pub, the Sherlock Holmes, run―elementary, my dear Watson―by a British expat. But the bulk of their production is bottle-conditioned. Marcus uses Pilsner and Maris Otter malts and darker grains for color and flavor with Fuggles, Goldings, Hallertau and Saaz pellet hops in brewing kit built in New Zealand.
The range includes Blond, with fine, floral Saaz notes and juicy malt; Bronze with spicy hops, sultana fruit and a dry, hoppy finish; and 55, a 5.5 percent beer with a massive peppery hop aroma (40 bitterness units), orange and tangerine fruit on the palate and a rich fruity and spicy finish. White is a Belgian-inspired wheat beer with a coriander and peppery hops character while Black is an English-style stout matured in bottle for six months, with oatmeal making up 10 percent of the grist.
In sharp distinction, the Two Brothers Brewery is in a downtown area of Melbourne, on an industrial estate. Founders Dave and Andrew Ong have a spacious warehouse that houses a bar as well as brewery. They welcome blue-collar drinkers from the surrounding units, who drop in after work for a cold lager, but Dave and Andrew hope to entice them on to more flavorsome beers. Two Brothers has an impressive modern plant but it can accurately be called “a Mickey Mouse brewery.” The kit comes from a failed brewery in New York City. The Disney Corporation bought the site because it needed a warehouse facility there. Disney helped the brothers load the brewing kit on to giant trailers during the night as the local authority wouldn’t allow them to drive the trailers through the streets during the day: photos on the walls trace the hectic midnight dismantling of the brewing equipment.
