The Good Life
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Byron Bay industry – brewing beer Story and photos by Simon Haslam
the addition of hops and yeast, I could taste the surprisingly sweet biscuity flavour of the malted grain.
If you thought the toughest jobs in Byron were feeding Insta and running an Airbnb, then spare a thought for these poor blokes who have to make beer. Head brewer Alistair Gillespie only has time to surf once most days, and when I arrived at the Byron Bay Brewery at 10am last week they were already working! At least Alistair has the good grace to acknowledge that, after moving from Cape Town to Byron, it still feels like he’s landed a dream job. The Lion Nathan group took over the working brewery and restaurant a year ago, and venue manager Adam Keane has worked hard to lift it from 119 in the Tripadvisor restaurant rankings to the top five. ‘People love the experience of coming here’, says Adam, ‘that’s what it’s all about. They can see the vats of brewing beer all around them, and see Alistair and assistant brewer Louis sweating it out every day brewing the exact beer that they’re drinking on tap. ‘To date The Hazy One has sold more than 15,000 schooners at the venue, and pair that with the 4,441 frites served and the 2,718 portions of calamari served, and you have a venue that provides great food, great beers with a great atmosphere in an even better location.’
The Hazy One in cans soon
The scale of the industry surprised me. ‘We are brewing as much as we can here’, says Alistair, ‘but we’ve reached capacity’. Customers who sample the beers at the brewery often ask for something to take away as a memento of their visit, so from October, The Hazy One will be available in cans at the brewery. To make this happen Alistair has to brew further afield. ‘Breweries have a fairly large environmental footprint’, says Alistair, ‘mainly because of the amount of water used. It makes sense, rather than build a new brewery, to use an existing brewery. I hopped on the plane last month with my recipe and went down to the West End brewery in Adelaide. They brew Kirin, Lashes, West End Assistant brewer Louis gets a thumb workout draught and many other beers there, Alistair in Byron’s version of a sweatshop, testing the beer. Brewing is a very scientific but I chose it because the equipment with visual cue. Lager is a German word for and team are phenomenal. ‘storehouse’: Lagerbier was traditionally brewed process requiring constant monitoring to in autumn and stored in caves in a ‘slow’ process ensure consistent quality and flavour from ‘There’s a lot of planning involved in every batch. that saw the beer ready to drink in spring. a big brew, months before the actual brew day, but it was basically the same as at home in Byron, just a much bigger batch. One of the One of the most popular beers brewed in Byron is The Hazy favourite at festivals. things we had to do was to match the sample of Byron water I One, an award-winning craft lager with ‘melon, apricot and ‘About 80 per cent of beer drinkers in Australia drink lager, and took down with me – the Adelaide water contains a lot of some stonefruit-like flavours’ from the Australian and NZ hops, and having a craft lager is a great introduction to craft beers’, says minerals and less of others, but at West End they were able to biscuity, bready notes from the predominantly Australian malts Alistair. exactly match my water profile to ensure the beer tastes the Alistair has chosen. Despite the rise in hardcore craft beer enthusiasts, surprisingly same as it does up here’. ‘It’s been a bestseller since the start’, says Alistair, ‘because it few beer drinkers know much about the process of production. More info: Cans of The Hazy One will be sold from possibly suits the Byron climate’. The beer is served on tap, onsite, but I learnt something new: there is no actual ‘malt’ – the barley as early as October. Where: Byron Bay Brewery (and also kegged at the Byron Bay brewery and then ‘exported’ grain itself, which has undergone the malting process, is the participating bottleshops). 1 Skinners Shoot Rd, Byron Bay. outside the Shire to about 60 other pubs. It is also a crowd malt. Trying that mixture straight from the brewing vats, before www.byronbaybrewing.com.au
Bestselling craft lager
Red earth, children, farm sheds, giant pigs By: Simon Haslam It was all red earth, rolling hills, gum trees, farm sheds and giant pigs as this school group visited The Farm last week to learn a bit about how food is actually made on a working farm. The Farm’s mission is to ‘Grow, Feed and Educate’, and school tours are an important part of the education process for the pigs, who learn an unnerving amount about human behaviour with each outing. It’s hard to believe that you can be part of an idyllic country scene, and buy local produce while also eating top-quality food and sipping a double espresso (or a cocktail) at the Three
Blue Ducks, but that’s how things roll in this part of Byron. It’s hard to actually see the pigs in this photo, as our insipid photographer didn’t want to get too close, but they were roughly the mass of ten children. Possibly regular school visits contribute to the pigs’ colossal girth – I would definitely have been counting heads as the kids got back onto the bus. More info: The Farm. Open 7 days from 7am. 11 Ewingsdale Rd, Ewingsdale. www.thefarmbyronbay.com.au.
Life, with oysters By Simon Haslam With oysters, champagne and worldrenowned Balcony executive chef Sean Connolly on hand for table service, these local women looked like they were having a great time at the Balcony’s Oyster Festival Launch party. The month-long ‘festival’ at the venue involves a specialty oyster menu, oyster cocktails, $1 oyster hour from 5 till 6pm every day and games from 6 till 8pm Tuesday
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and Thursday. There’s still a week to go, and although it’s highly unlikely that they will run out of oysters and champagne in that time, you might like to pop in and give them a scare. Katie Munro and Emma McClean (from Children of the Tribe) and Claire AlexanderJohnston (from @jetsetmama) Photo Mia Forrest.
The Byron Shire Echo August 23, 2017 27