News & Feature Stories
WA Beer Week Is Back
Just as craft beer in Australia has its origins in WA, so do beer weeks. While Melbourne’s Good Beer Week may be the most high profile of those in existence today, with others found in Queensland,…
We Are Family
Family breweries are hardly unique in Australia. Throughout the craft beer world, you will find tiny setups comprised of husband and wife, mum and dad, brother and sister, father and son. But, as far as…
New Beers: Riverside, Mountain Goat, Nail, Moon Dog, Murray's
The backend of The Crafty Pint has developed something of a Bermuda Triangle at the minute. Whenever we try to add a new beer to a brewery it disappears as soon as we hit “Publish” and the…
Pacific To Rule Britannia?
This month’s attendances at the Man Utd and Liverpool pre-season friendlies in Sydney and Melbourne have shown Aussies still have quite an appetite for certain British exports (despite the Ashes, Lions,…
A Brewery With Beer
The Odyssey Tavern has been going great guns since bringing eight taps and multiple fridges full of craft beer to VIctoria’s Surf Coast last year. Yet it wasn’t living up to its name. From day one,…
Bootleg Rebooted
Next year, Bootleg Brewery will celebrate two decades of craft brewing in Margaret River. It’s a quite remarkable achievement in a region known primarily for wine – and perhaps the odd shark or two.…
James Halliday Article - Stout Advice
With our next piece for James Halliday’s Wine Companion Magazine sent off to the publishers today, it seems a good time to dust down another of our features for the mag. What’s more, our latest dip…
Project X
If you had the last keg of a limited release baltic porter, what would you do? Most of us would grab an empty glass and start pouring but Justin Fox, head brewer at Colonial Brewery, instead saw an opportunity…
Hop Plotting
In their increasingly challenging battle to meet the world’s insatiable desire, hop producers the world over are constantly looking to produce more hops. Not just more in terms of volume, but more in…
Blog of the Month: beerwinebeer
With the British & Irish Lions have beaten the Wallabies and Andy Murray the new King of Wimbledon, it seems only right to look north for inspiration for the latest featured blog. And where better to go…
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Show Off Yer Biceps
Many fun things have come the way of The Crafty Pint since the site was launched: a night on an island in the middle of a croc-infested river; a trip to the States to talk about Aussie beer; beer trivia…
Getting Blind With Crafty: Brown Ales
What with things having turned cooler for most of Australia, for the fifth Crafty Pint Blind Tasting Panel we decided it was time to turn towards the darker realms of the beer world. And, with the star…
Drinking in Style: Brown Ales
After a brief post-Good Beer Week hiatus, the Crafty Pint Blind Tasting Panel returned this week and with it our regular series looking at beer styles is back. Crafty Towers' resident beer scholar (he’s…
Kiwi Beervana
Australia is blessed with many festivals dedicated to craft beer these days. But few, if any, do things as well as Beervana, the annual two-day festival in Wellington, as The Crafty Pint discovered when…
Hop Rockin'
Anyone who has paid even the slightest attention to Boatrocker since the brewery’s first beer appeared will be well aware that its founder, Matt Houghton, is pretty fond of hops. The first beer, Alpha…
Roast and Mash
Tasmania is blessed with an abundance of amazing produce. Obviously, there’s the beer, but on previous trips we’ve sampled fantastic wines, cheeses, chocolates, salmon, ginseng, whisky, gin, mussels……
Meet Crafty's Agony Aunt
One of the defining features of the Australian craft beer world – and one of its finest attributes – is its all encompassing warm embrace. As highlighted by the seemingly unstoppable run of collaborations,…
Stones & Woods
The Stone & Wood story is one of the most remarkable in Australian craft beer. It’s less than five years since three mates decided to turn their back on the corporate beer world and literally live the…
Great Beer. Fine Food
At this year’s Good Beer Week, there was a dazzling array of events pairing beer and food in every way imaginable. Beer and fondue, IPAs and curry, beer and chocolate and so on and so on. Beer went…
Crafty Pint Newsletter Archive
Ever since The Crafty Pint launched in September 2010, we’ve been sending out weekly newsletters (almost) every Friday. Designed to wrap up the events of the past week, look ahead to what’s…
Back A Brewer
He’s only 26 but already Evan Hunter has made whisky at Lark Distillery (as pictured above) and brewed with Moo Brew and Seven Sheds. And now he’s set on opening his own brewpub – with your help.…
More Ways To Join
The Craft Beer Industry Association is on a roll. Last month’s Craft Brewers Conference – Australia’s first – was deemed a success by those who attended and saw the national association…
The QHC Returns
The craft beer scene in Queensland has been enjoying welcome growth in the past couple of years, with a steady rise in the number of quality beer bars and new breweries. Its home brewing scene is equally…
Brewing's Back In Bendigo
It’s more than 100 years since the last new brewery opened in Bendigo, according to Doug Brooke, and decades since the last one closed. But, thanks to him, the city only has to wait another couple of…
Blog of the Month: Two Brewers Abroad
Given it’s been rather more than a month since we last ran a feature on one of the many colourful blogs that exist in the world of Aussie craft beer, the series' name is becoming a little less than accurate.…
A Craftier Colony
At the risk of being castigated by the brewers, beer lovers and venue owners of our home state of Victoria, it’s been The Crafty Pint’s contention for some months now that there is currently no more…
Tell Us About It!
Back in April, Elwood teacher Torben Vedelsby left the classroom to find voicemails and emails awaiting him from the Good Beer Week team. Did he still live in Melbourne? Did he remember filling in a survey…
Good Beer Week 2013: The Bishop & The Pope vs Red Hill
Event: The Bishop & The Pope vs Red Hill Venue: Bishop of Ostia and Pope Joan, East Brunswick Date: May 22, 2013 Good Beer Week Stream: Foodie The Event: In 2012, the neighbouring East Brunswick venues…
Brew Am I
Having blown up Melbourne’s Cherry Bar on the last night of Good Beer Week with a night of hard rock, blues and craft beer, the original instigator of the Rockstar Brews concept in Oz is teaming up with…
Good Beer Week 2013: Birra Del Borgo Degustation Dinner at Grossi Florentino
Event: Birra del Borgo Degustation Dinner Venue: The Wynn Room at Grossi Florentino Date: May 21, 2013 Good Beer Week Stream: Foodie Preamble: There is an unwritten law in the craft beer world which states:…
Breaking New Territory
Darwin is set to host its first craft beer festival later this month. The Darwin Beer Festival takes over the city’s spectacular waterfront Convention Centre, with more than 80 craft beers and ciders…
What A Week!
The first Good Beer Week took us by surprise as it came out of nowhere. The second one took us by surprise as it went off so much more than the first one. This time around, the committee that runs the…
AIBA 2013 Winners
Back at the end of 2012, when compiling our 50 Beers of 2012 for James Halliday’s Wine Companion Magazine, we wrote: “The powers-that-be push stablemate Fat Yak but those in the know drink Matilda…
Good Beer Week 2013: Boilermaker at The Beaufort
Event: Boilermaker at the Beaufort Venue: The Beaufort Date: May 21, 2013 Good Beer Week Stream: Beer Geek The Event: Many people’s knowledge of a boilermaker probably extends so far as a shot of whisky…
South West At The Fest
Somewhere in south west WA there is a brewery tank full of hefeweizen made with cacao husks. A few kilometers away is another brewery tank, but this one is full of porter made with coconut and vanilla…
Good Beer Week 2013: Cavalier Creation Degustation
Event: Cavalier Creation Degustation Venue: Slowbeer Date: May 21, 2013 Good Beer Week Stream: Foodie The Event Collaboration and craft beer are no strangers; whether it’s between two breweries…
The NSW Invasion
The New South Wales craft beer scene has been bubbling away furiously in recent times and it’s finally spilling over into neighbouring Victoria for Good Beer Week 2013. It means that, this week, Melbourne…
Crafty Tales Launches
There are a lot of very talented people in the craft beer world. And not just the brewers either. In our relatively short lifetime, The Crafty Pint has been lucky enough to work with a number of filmmakers,…
Good Beer Week 2013: The Big Apple & The Goat
Event: The Big Apple & The Goat Venue: Mountain Goat Brewery Date: May 18, 2013 Good Beer Week Stream: Beer Geek The Event: Good Beer Week’s highlight Beer Geek event came in two parts. There…
Good Beer Week: Going, Going, Gone
The first event to sell out for this year’s Good Beer Week was gone in less than 12 hours. Others have been following with regularity ever since. So, as one of the festival’s media partners,…
ARE YOU READY!!!!!
The wait is almost over – the third Good Beer Week kicks off in less than 24 hours. The Crafty Pint will be there at 8.30am tomorrow morning for the start of the very first event, The Big Apple &…
The Bicep's Back
It started as a bit of fun. Challenged with brewing an unusual beer for the Media Brew beer competition at Beervana, The Crafty Pint approached Murray’s to be its partner. They agreed and were soon afterwards…
Get Ready for Good Beer Week - The Brewers: Kiwi Invasion
New Zealand has a craft beer scene that sparked into life earlier than ours and, dare we say it, has a greater strength in depth than Australia (for now at least). We’ve been lucky enough to have…
Getting Blind With Crafty: Pint of Origin Pale-Off
The latest Crafty Pint Blind Tasting Panel was one with a touch of Good Beer Week about it. With the festival imminent – and amongst its attractions the expanded Pint of Origin state-by-state showcase…
Up For GABS
Where do you go after scaling up an event you’d previously run for a few hundred people at your pubs to an epic featuring almost 60 brand new beers in a heritage listed building that attracted around…
Statement On Temple's Liquidation
A little over a week ago, word reached The Crafty Pint that Temple Brewery & Brasserie had gone into voluntary liquidation. This sad news was leavened by a conversation with one of the owners who assured…
Drinking in Style: American Pale Ales
With Good Beer Week imminent, we figured we should do a Pint of Origin style face-off for the next Crafty Pint Blind Tasting Panel. So later today, the motley crew of brewers (amateur and professional),…
Get Ready For Good Beer Week - The Brews: Rockstars!
Sometimes you just know you should probably have said no to the question: “Just one more?” But sometimes inspiration can strike… It was late in the evening at last year’s Newcastle…
Good Beer Wheaty
“Blame the Yeastie Boys!” Could this be the craft beer world’s equivalent of the Monopoly “Get Out Of Jail Free” card? Certainly, it’s a cry we expect to hear a lot…
Brew Oyster Cult
The Crafty Pint has only been around for 30 months, yet in that time we’ve seen one of Australia’s craft beer characters crop up in a number of guises. Steve “Hendo” Henderson once landed at Prickly…
