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Year In Beer 2024: National Trends & South Australia
The Crafty Pint's Year In Beer series for 2024 is going to look rather different to all those that have come before. We launched our podcast back in July and have decided to use this platform for our state by state by territory reflections.
You can read the launch article for the series here; this addresses some of the key trends we've observed on a national level in 2024. For the remainder of the series, we speak to guests from every state and territory – both Crafty Pint contributors and people who've enjoyed notable years – and will be publishing those episodes every few days through to the end of the year. First up: South Australia.
In a handy bit of timing, Will and I had driven from Melbourne to Adelaide for an event at The Wheaty, where the second of the interviews for this show was filmed, just as we were preparing to launch the Year In Beer 2024 series. It allowed us to sit down with the guests in person, as well as using our travels to record a number of episodes that will appear in 2025.
First up for the South Australia wrap, we chatted to long-term Crafty Pint writer Matt King, who’s been covering the state's scene for us for a decade. He recently decided to call it a day when it comes to beer writing to focus on his real job and family, so the chat doubled up as a trip down Memory Lane through that decade spent covering beer in SA.
Following Matt, we’re joined by Briony Liebich and Steve Brockman. Briony runs Flavour Logic, where she specialises in teaching sensory skills to brewers and anyone else in and around the industry, and is also a much-respected judge of beer, cider, spirits and more.
Steve is an experienced brewer with a career that's taken him to the States and back who switched from Brightstar Brewing to take up a technical sales manager position at AMSAT Character Malts earlier in 2024. He's also SA State Lead for the Independent Brewers Association so, between the trio, they have a broad overview of the industry from different perspectives.
We discuss the state of the SA beer scene in 2024, local trends such as a greater focus on supporting local and drinking lagers, the success of the state's brewers at beer awards, not least Uraidla and Loophole at the Indies in Perth, new openings, the ongoing triumph that is the ever-evolving Beer & BBQ Fest, and more.
The chat with the first of our guests starts at the nine minute mark.
Prior to that, we discuss our Year In Beer: The National Picture article and the previous week's news, including the uplifting tale of Tumut River Brewing, where former staff have bought the brewpub from liquidators, and the opening of FOUND.Subiaco.
You can watch or listen to the episode here or on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube and other podcast platforms. Please like and subscribe – and if you are enjoying the show, please rate and review it too.
Cheers!
The Crafty Pint's 2024 Year In Beer series is proudly presented by Mogwai Labs, leaders in liquid yeast solutions. For the perfect pitch every time, visit mogwailabs.com.au. If you'd like to support future shows, get in touch.
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.
