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Supplying Indie Brewers As An Indie Producer
One of the side benefits of the rise of craft beer in Australia has been the way it has brought other small – or craft, if you prefer – businesses to life alongside it. Sure, for most people who enjoy drinking the stuff, it's the liquid in their glass that matters most, then the brewers, venues and retailers bringing it to them next.
Over the years, however, we've witnessed and reported on the creation and evolution of all manner of operations that may not exist were it not for the potential customers out there: those have founded or work for the nation's indie brewers. There's the mobile canning operators, graphic designers able to focus on the craft drinks producers they love, producers of bespoke glassware, and so on.
Arguably, nowhere is this more true than in the world of ingredients. While the vast majority of malt, hops and yeast used by the nation's brewers still comes from the larger producers and suppliers – whether grown and sourced in Australia or overseas – there's a growing (sorry...) number of smaller operations dotted around the country.
People are having a crack at growing hops outside the country's traditional growing regions of High Country Victoria and Tasmania: in parts of New South Wales, South Australia, Western Australia and even Queensland. There are maltsters working with local farmers to bring heritage grain varieties back to life or provide small batch specialty options for brewers. And there are even those who have decided to dedicate their lives to providing Aussie brewers – pro and home – with local yeast too.
Derek Lacey belongs in the last of those categories. He's the former medical researcher who, while spending time as a stay-at-home dad, had a "Eureka!" moment that led to the creation of Melbourne-based Bluestone Yeast.
The business launched in 2018, providing local liquid yeasts for brewers, and has been growing ever since to the point that, at time of writing, Derek and his team are putting the finishing touches to a new, far larger production facility. Given said facility is around 800m from Crafty Towers, we felt it was the ideal time to invite him onto the show.
He joined us in the studio for a chat about how he came to swap medical research for his new career, the challenges and triumphs he and the brewers he works with have experienced along the way, what it's like operating as a small indie producer supplying craft brewers and those making beer in their homes, his future plans to diversify, and the lessons learned along the way.
As someone who was born in Ireland, albeit having moved to Australia as a child, he has the gift of the gab and shares as many stories as he does insight on life at a yeast manufacturing business. In the intro to this episode, we also discuss the latest news, including new openings and the ongoing travails of some local businesses.
You can find the episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and YouTube. Please like and subscribe – and if you are enjoying the show, please rate and review too so we can reach more people and get them excited about the delights of Aussie craft beer.
Cheers!
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James Smith launched The Crafty Pint in 2010, two years after moving to Australia from the UK. He was taken to Mountain Goat within weeks of landing in Melbourne, joined their indoor cricket team, and is still navigating the rabbit hole that is craft beer to this day.
The beers that turned you on to good beer:
- Watching pints of McEwan's 80 Shilling settle when visiting family in Edinburgh.
- Pints of flat Bass from the jug at the Cap & Stocking in Kegworth.
- A first Paulaner Hefeweizen when working in Munich in 1998: “This smells of bananas!”
- Castle Rock Harvest Pale – how could a 3.8 percent ABV beer be so good? (It turns out it was an early example of the three Cs – Cascade, Centennial and Columbus – in an English bitter).
- Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA poured through hops at the Sunset Grill in Cambridge, MA, in the company of a man who turned out to be the Beer Nut (while we were both covering a double murder case at the time).
- Ordering a Mountain Goat Hightail on my first day as an Aussie resident as it was local and I’d never heard of it; “A dark Australian beer; well I never…”
- Murray’s Icon 2IPA at Beer DeLuxe Fed Square, recommended by a guy I’d not long known who's now the main man at Fixation, served by Mik Halse, now head of sales at Hawkers. How could an Australian beer smell as good as that?!?
You've got three beers to turn someone else on to good beer; what are they and why?
- Any really good, fresh and balanced West Coast style IPA. Punchy hop aromatics are the most obvious way to capture someone's attention and these IPAs, done well, present the key components in beer (if you're sticking to just water, malt, hops and yeast) in harmony yet with the volume turned up.
- Saison Dupont. Arguably a selfish choice here as I bloody love the broad saison style and dearly hope it will finally take hold in Australia one day. Given a choice, I'd probably crack one enlivened with Brettanomyces like Molly Rose Matilde for myself but, when it comes to turning on someone new, you've got to go with the classic.
- Rodenbach Caractère Rouge. Because if you don't enjoy or can't appreciate this beer, I'll never win you over. And because Filip, the fruit and wood specialist at Rodenbach that designed it, is a beautiful human.
The last beer you enjoyed:
Fixation IPA at The Incubator.
Three things that represent you:
- The Soft Bulletin by The Flaming Lips
- Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
- Golden Plains
NB All articles written by James in the first eight years of the site appear as By Crafty Pint. Today, that's used for collaborative efforts by the wider team.
