Craft beer.
A new wave of craft brewers engage their locals to foster a sense of community, writes MAX ALLEN.
When you pick up a cold beer at the end of a long day, do you think about the people who brewed it? The people who grew the hops? Malted the barley, harvested the barley? Topher Boehm of Wildflower Brewing & Blending in Sydney believes we should think about these things, and all the other factors that went into making your favourite beer.
Every November, Boehm hosts a public event called Waratah Day at his Marrickville barrel hall and cellar door, in an atmospheric 1890s warehouse, to discuss these issues. The event coincides with the launch of his Waratah beer.
Last November, Boehm invited a diverse crowd to speak, from people who supply him with some of those raw ingredients, to brewer friends, and your correspondent. To emphasise the community-building angle of the event, all money raised on the day, from ticket sales to beer sales, went to organisations working in rural mental health.
Chris and Samantha Greenwood and their three children live on an organic farm north of Jerilderie in the Riverina, NSW, and grow an old variety of barley. Chris Greenwood spoke about what it’s like to grow unconventional grains using unconventional, regenerative farming methods, in one of the worst droughts he’s ever seen.
“Everyone told us growing barley organically couldn’t be done,” he says. “But we’ve spent the last four years building the soil up, and what we’ve seen is nothing short of extraordinary. We’ve seen the soil come to life, seen the plants grow healthier, seen them fend off disease, seen the crops hang on longer in the drought.”
Building relationships with other people in the supply chain, such as Stu Whytcross and Brad Woolner of Voyager Craft Malt led to the Greenwoods planting the Schooner variety of barley, first bred in the 1980s specifically for malting. Long overlooked by the farming community in favour of more modern, high-yielding fodder varieties of barley, Schooner has the flavour qualities that craft brewers like Topher Boehm are looking for.
“We’ve found once you bring the community together, once you bring that link, it works,” says Chris Greenwood.
“If we don’t have that kind of support from brewers we can’t keep going.”
Jade McManus co-founded Ryefield Hops in Bemboka, southern NSW four years ago with her sister and brother-in-law on their family farm.
She spoke about how the history of an Aboriginal community growing hops for the first time at Coranderrk in the Yarra Valley in the 1870s inspired her approach to regenerative farming.
“Sometimes you need to go back in time to go forward,” says McManus. “The Aboriginal people harvested eight tonnes
of hops in their first two years of growing, which is astounding. It shows how good the soil was. And that’s because Aboriginal people had good custodianship of the land, and that’s where we need to get to. As hop growers we see that as our goal.”
Chris and Gab Moore decided to move from Sydney to Orbost in East Gippsland, Gab’s old hometown, when their second child was on the way (they have since had another). When they set up the Sailor’s Grave Brewing in the town’s old butter factory they quickly realised they would only be able to build a sustainable business by engaging with the local community.
“What we realised setting up in small town like Orbost is, it’s all about people,” says Chris. “We’d ask the locals: what have you got? A lemon tree, blueberries? Can we put it in our beer? That created some community interest. We’re trying to build a common purpose.” Gab sees potential for reviving local interest in agriculture. She has joined the Orbost show committee, and is engaging local farmers to grow barley, to encourage more of a connection with the brewery. “After I left Orbost high-school, I thought, I’m outta here, I’m never coming back,” says Gab. “Now our kids go to the local school and I’m so glad we’re back there. I’m so glad that we’re part of making a change in the town.”
Listening to these people made me feel connected, through space and time, to the process of beer production, from the paddock to my palate. It reinforced my view that – as hop-grower Jade McManus put it – the best way we as consumers can help ensure the sustainability of this process is to buy the beers that support the farmers who have good environmental practices. To create a network of common purpose, by thinking about all the people who make beer possible. ●