On Saturday the 14th of October I visited Willie The Boatman Brewery in St Peters, New South Wales. This brewery was first established in 2012, but has only been in operation at its present site for about three years. It is owned by Nick and Patrick who had been home brewing in the Tempe area for years and then decided to take the big step of quitting their jobs to establish a brewery.
The brewery is all about bringing people together and the local characters of the area. The name for the brewery came after hearing of one such local character while on a history walk through the surrounding suburbs. William Kerr was a convict in the 1800s who worked for a local shipwrights, he used to row people and goods across the river, as well as getting up to much more mischief. So the brewery is named after this local personality.
The brewery consists of a 12 hectolitre brew system that was converted from dairy equipment with four 12 hectolitre and three 24 hectolitre fermentation tanks. It is very manual in operation especially the one prong bottling line. They put 75% of their production into kegs with the remainder being bottled. When they are working at full capacity they can manage to bottle 1000 bottles in a week and put through four batches of beer or about 5000 litres. They also run a 150 litre pilot system to produce special small batches and new experimental brews.
The beers that I sampled were:
M’ville Lager, 5.0% abv, this is their biggest seller, it has a straw colour and a subtle malt aroma. The flavour is of sweet malt on a crisp, dry, gentle bitter finish.
Albo Corn Ale, 5.0% abv, 10 IBU, named after the local politician, this has a golden colour and a malt aroma. It has a sweet malt taste and then a gentle fruity bitter finish.
Nectar of the Hops, East Coast IPA, 6.0% abv, 20 IBU, this is made with Mosaic, Centennial, Cascade and Amarillo hops. It has a hazy golden colour and a pine and citrus aroma. The flavour is of sweet fruit before a resinous hop bitter finish. Very nice!
Black Bunny, 4.9% abv, this is a traditional English Dark Ale that uses eight different malts. It has a black colour and a roasted malt aroma of coffee and dark chocolate. It has a complex malt flavour with strong hints of chocolate, coffee and smoked meat. Delicious!
Crazy Ivan IPA, 6.0% abv, 40 IBU, this was served by the hand pump which gives it a nice smooth mouth feel. It has a cloudy golden appearance and a strong citrus hop aroma. The flavour is of a strong, sweet, fruitiness before a big, lingering hop bitterness on the finish.
The beers at Willie The Boatman were all very good, the venue is not huge but there is still a fair bit of room to sit and have a drink. They often have a food van outside as well.
I would like to thank Joel, the head brewer, for taking the time to talk with me and show me through the brewery, for his hospitality.