Food & Drink
The Old Coast Road Brewery creates brews with a difference, discovers Anita Hurst.
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brews
yalup’s Old Coast Road Brewery is not your average boozy brewery. The previous 25-hectare former cattle property owned by former pharmacist Andrew Harris was a distant olive grove dream away until Andrew grew tired of the pharmaceutical profession and set upon creating a new kind of remedy of the cold and frothy kind. His new venture began as a microbrewery and restaurant, before he later expanded it to include a cider production and a distillery. In the beginning, there were also four main beers but now the Old Coast Road Brewery has one of the largest range of beers of any microbrewery in Western Australia, with up to 19 beers and ciders on tap at any time. Many are produced on a rotational basis, so be prepared to visit the brewery and give a different beer or cider a try on every visit. This is a brewery that keeps everything local where possible: for instance, they pickle their own olives every year and sell them from the brewery. Unlike most other breweries they
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FOUND | autumn • winter 2018
make their cider from scratch from Donnybrook fruit that they crush and press themselves. It’s a special kind of Bunbury Geographe cross-regional love that locals and visitors alike applaud. The first stage of planting saw over 1,000 olive trees of mixed varieties being put in place. As Andrew is half Italian and his wife, Ivanka, is Croatian it was important that there would be a strong Mediterranean influence in their olive grove. It’s fair to say they’ve succeeded in this regard; you could be stepping into a Sicilian olive grove if you squint a bit. Another milestone for the business was the release in 2014 of their first batch of fiveyear-old single malt whiskey, Bellwether. They’ve also hitched
a ride on the current gin craze, producing their own tripledistilled gin made with nine different botanicals. Make sure you try too their limoncello – it’s made with Harvey lemon peel. There are eight small batch spirits available served straight out of the barrels, something that’s pretty unique for WA. This includes a Peruvian-style pisco, an American-style rye whiskey, a brandy made from local wine, a citrus vodka made from local oranges and several spirits made from distilled beer – known in Germany as beer schnapps. Fancy having a specialised brew while the kids play ball? Or even better, fancy having a brew while your kids are in a bubble ball? Super fun zorb footy can be found on the large recreation lawn during the
summer months. In true Italian fashion, family is front and centrel at Andrew and Ivanka’s brewery. If you head to the Old Coast Road Brewery on a Sunday you’ll be treated to some cool and groovy beats with live music playing all day, making it practically the law to linger as long as possible. If you’re visiting with a a loved one, why not stay at the nearby Eden Grove Harvey? If you’re feeling really adventurous, you can even book a tandem skydiving experience and land in the brewery’s grounds. In any case, you’ll receive a local produce hamper from Bizee Hands on arrival - make sure you try out the brewery’s new wood-fired pizza oven too. That’s amore.
FAST FACTS The Old Coast Brewery, Lot 1238 West Break Road & Forestry Road, Myalup. Visit ocrb.com.au or call 1300 792 106
visitbunburygeographe.com.au