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Voyager's Vision
361 Plays3 days ago
“We don’t produce bulk commodity malt; we’re here to create malts that craft brewers and distillers can leverage off.”
Here at The Crafty Pint we’ve made little secret of our admiration for the work of Stu Whytcross and Brad Woolner, the founders of Voyager Craft Malt. If we were betting sorts, we’d wager their impact – not just on beer and distilling, but farming and their home region in the Riverina – will be as great as any business to have operated within the wider beer world this century.
Ahead of their inaugural Grainstock – a three-day event celebrating grain’s role in brewing, distilling and baking for both industry and consumers – we joined them at the Whitton Malt House. It’s the mighty impressive venue, accommodation, golf range, fishing lake and more created by Southern Cotton that sits alongside Voyager’s equally impressive production facility.
As well as discussing their vision for Grainstock, they tell us how they’ve been competitive mates since primary school, how they first considered opening a brewery before heading down the malting route, how early support from Batch Brewing Co and Wildflower founder Topher Boehm helped them get going, how they’re working with forward-thinking farmers to promote practices that are better for the land while reigniting interest in ancient and forgotten grains, and much more besides, including their world champion malt and desire to help more local malting operations flourish.
From the Riverina to the Northern Kimberley, where James joined Will from a giant termite mound to cast an eye over part three of our guide to beer in Tasmania’s north, Briony Liebich’s guide to tasting beer like a pro, the latest addition to our venue directory – the Bright Brewery-owned PA’s in Carlton, the launch of the sixth GABS Can Design Awards, and the latest giveaways and events for members of our Crafty Cabal beer club.
If you enjoy the show, please like and subscribe, rate and review, and maybe even tell your mates!
Start of segments:
- 13:15 – Voyager Part 1
- 44:57 – Breaking Down Beer Styles with Mogwai Labs
- 51:15 – Voyager Part 2
To find out more about featuring on The Crafty Pint Podcast or otherwise partnering with The Crafty Pint, contact craig@craftypint.com.
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Transcript
Introduction to The Crafty Pint Podcast
00:00:06
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Crafty Pint Podcast. I'm Will. I'm James. Good see you Will. How's things there in ah sunny Melbourne? It's wonderful. We really turned a corner on the weekend. there was The sun was out. It felt like a beautiful time. My neighbour just yelled at me when I walked outside and said, you can feel summer's coming.
00:00:23
Speaker
Excellent. Hence why you're wearing a thick hoodie in inside. Well, it's actually a ah Voyager hoodie, so we'll get to that later. Yes, yeah. A very nice bit of on-brand attire.
00:00:35
Speaker
Excellent. How are you?
James' Travel Tales and Adventures
00:00:38
Speaker
Oh, yeah, pretty good. to Just about to pack down the tent for the umpteenth time, but we're we've broken the back of our the the part of the trip where we're in the tent. We're back with the caravan in about a week's time, temporarily.
00:00:50
Speaker
um And... were ah We're in the very north of the Kimberley. We were up in this place, Mitchell Falls, recently. um The roads have got a little bit rough since I spoke to you. I now have both the car registration plate and the battery held in place with cable tires um after the mount cracked the other day.
00:01:06
Speaker
ah The closest thing I've had to a shower in the last five days was in a waterfall. a couple of days ago so thankfully you can't smell me um and i thought for today's backdrop we'd go with a giant termite mound that were the kids a bit younger i'd still try and convince them was actually a dinosaur turd but um i figured it was the the um nearest thing to local color i could give you um and i do actually one one you wouldn't there's not much in the way of uh well anything up here other than wonderful nature and rock art um But i the family and I went for sunset over the Mitchell plateau the other day, which is sort the but yeah so northern part of the Kimberleys over the waterfalls we we'd hike to early in the day.
Beer Enthusiasts and Cultural Journeys
00:01:44
Speaker
Got chatting to a young couple called ah Riley and Lucy, who work, they're some mechanical engineers, engineers around Port Hedland, that sort of area. ah They were spending few weeks in the in the Kimberley, talked to them to beer.
00:01:56
Speaker
It turns out they're huge Mountain Culture fans and actually flew to Sydney from WA recently just to visit Mountain Culture's three venues. So I sent Harriet a photo of the sunset and told her.
00:02:08
Speaker
Sadly, I don't have Riley and Lucy's number details, but if you are watching, because Riley said he has read some Crafty Pine articles, Harriet says she will shout you some beers when they finally open in Perth. um not no There's no exclusive there. i yeah i just said I was about to say what's happening with Rocky Ridge. Yeah, yeah where's the exclusive? no so i did I said to her that um that they were devastated that um they took on you know the Hobart and the Melbourne sites but hadn't taken on Perth. And Harriet says when we when we do um Perth, we'll do it you know the best way they can and she'll be happy to shout them beers. So Riley and Lucy, if you want to shoot shoot us your details, I'll pass them on to Harriet for when that that happy moment arrives.
00:02:46
Speaker
Oh no, it probably says a lot about my mindset, but all I could think about that lovely story was how upset they must be that there won't be a mountain culture Perth the next few weeks. No, but it is a nice touch. I was drinking a Rocky Ridge Gin Dong Juicy at the time, so there was a little bit of synergy there anyway. so um But anyway, yeah that's sort of you know it's nice to realise that you know craft beer is fighting its way to these remote parts of Australia in one way or another.
Spotlight on Travel and Culinary Series
00:03:11
Speaker
um And but on the on the topic of travel, we we wrapped up Benny's ah three-part northern, of north, northeast Tasmania um travel series this week with ah another lovely finish. there but All three pieces have been really well-received, actually.
00:03:25
Speaker
Yeah, I think ah Tasmanians love a bit of coverage of them is is the lesson I've taken from that. it It was good to, Benny really got to spend a lot of time down there, so it was good to really cover a lot of the state in that way.
00:03:39
Speaker
Yeah, and I think the line that I really enjoy, he talked about, you know, having the best lobster roll you'd ever had at a place in Ulverston. he's like, you know, it heaven may not be on earth, but if it if it is, it's a good good idea to start looking in Ulverston or something along those lines, which yeah led some interesting comments on the Facebook page.
00:03:57
Speaker
um Yeah, a lot Ulverston haters out there. Yeah, it it does appear, but also some Ulverston defenders. So it was nice to see them. And there was maybe a bit of a Bernie banter as well. So there you go. Yes.
00:04:09
Speaker
yeah And we're talking of travel. We also published a piece this week by Bryony Liebich from Flavor Logic. and She's been writing for us on and off for the last couple of years. Very well known and very well respected in the world of beer education, wine education, cider judging, everything. like she's but I think she's judged barrel aged vinegars and all all sorts of things over the years or olive oils or whatever it might be.
00:04:29
Speaker
um But she started a short series about how to taste and how to appreciate beer, um which she popped up on the site yesterday, Will. Yeah, it's a really, yeah I think that's useful for everyone, I would say. Like, it's the way she breaks it down, I was like, oh, this is such a wonderful, simple, straightforward language. Like, whether you sort of love beer and you drink beer and you wanted to understand it better, or sometimes I find, like, there's so much jargon out there that when I go to do tastings, I'm kind of like, how how can I simplify this better or what's the best way to get this across? And i felt like Briony really captured that in that article.
00:05:06
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And i think it's one of those things we've talked about on and off over the last few years, you know, whether that, you know, a lot people in the beer world world forgot about the importance of educating consumers and educating staff in venues and and bars and breweries and whatever.
00:05:19
Speaker
um So i think the more you know, the more you can appreciate beer. So yeah, and yeah we'll chuck link to that the show notes. And Brian's got some ideas for follow up pieces to come as well. um So yeah that was great.
Revisiting Old Haunts and New Developments
00:05:30
Speaker
um Also, you're on the site this week. You went and checked out Bright's um pub in Carlton, yeah your your old stomping ground as a student. Yeah, it was great to um pop down there. yeah Yeah. So that's a new listing on the site, the Prince Alfred Hotel PAs, as we always called it at uni. I actually didn't realize that they long ago had a um listing on the site. So I managed when I went to update it and turn it all back on this, this is a bit back of house for everyone, but I i got to see the old photos as well. And it really took me back to being in uni. Like I saw the tap bank and was like, wow, that's, I remember drinking two brothers Grizz there.
00:06:07
Speaker
Uh, in about, I don't know, 2012 or something like that. And are Bright still promising to offer, you know, sort of $6 jugs on a Monday night for students or is it a rather different affair?
00:06:18
Speaker
Well, it's definitely still, they've still got their uni nights. it's So yeah, that it's still going ahead like that. um Yeah, for those who don't know, it's it's literally opposite Melbourne Uni.
00:06:29
Speaker
um I think the uni might even be the landlord as well. So yeah, it's it's right in that precinct. But it's a pretty exciting part of Melbourne really because when the Metro Tunnel opens, it'll be sort of better connected to the rest of the CBD right now. It's right on the outskirts. So there's there's a lot happening and there's going to be a lot of development happening around there too. Yeah, there's a few funny little pockets like that around Melbourne that might so have a new lease of of life breathed into them. um' Good stuff.
Creative Collaborations and Awards
00:06:55
Speaker
ah Also shout out the Gab's Can Design Awards are open for a sixth time. So if any brewers or designers out there reckon they've got the best looking cans in the business, um there's some details about that we'll put in the show notes as well. and If you want to try and become the latest winner there,
00:07:09
Speaker
ah win some money for your designer and some and some prizes from Aurora as well. um And from cans to ah another essential part of the beer industry and
Insights into Voyager Craft Malt
00:07:20
Speaker
malt. And I think one of the, when we were talking about launching the podcast last year, one of the the guests or the the sort of the topics we really wanted to get on early was Voyager Craft Malt. And yeah, you and I headed up there a few weeks ago and sat down with Stu.
00:07:35
Speaker
And we even managed to lure Brad, his business partner and lifelong mate out of the kiln ah to come and join us for for a little while. Yeah, it was funny. i was I first met Brad at the A-Biz only a couple of months before we went up.
00:07:49
Speaker
And I was like, well, I was always wondering if you were some kind of secret. Stu really ran the business himself and Brad was some kind of, of I don't know, tax evasion or something like that.
00:08:01
Speaker
It's great to have them both on. You'll hear that Stu does do a fair bit of the talking for both of them, but it's it was really good to hear how they came together. And I think, um you know, their friendship really comes out across in the chat as well.
00:08:13
Speaker
Oh, yeah, for sure. I've long said I think what Stu and Brad are doing with Voyager is one of the most incredible stories in the entire sort of beer cosmos in in Australia in terms of what they're doing, you know, for changing, you know, farming practices and or helping people change farming practices, rediscovering old, delicious sort of malt and grain varieties.
00:08:35
Speaker
um the new life they're breathing into the region um in terms of opportunities um and certainly in partnership with Southern Cotton opening that just phenomenal Witten Malthouse which attendees at Grainstock will get to see later in the year um and you know the work they're doing to encourage other um small maltsters around Australia they've won you know two um golds at the World Malt Cup in the States.
00:08:56
Speaker
um And just the way they they they talk is just like, it's like they were so they were destined to do this. and And I think the impact they could have but they they probably have no idea the impact they're already having already. And I think the impact they could have long-term is quite phenomenal.
00:09:10
Speaker
um And obviously we we've talked about Grain Stop, which is their mainly industry, but also consumer event taking place in October. That is pretty exciting. and be really cool to see how many people they get out there. It's not just for the brewing industry, but for the distillers and for,
00:09:24
Speaker
bakers as well um but yeah it's just they they just they they speak very well and while brad might not be the most talkative i think he he had the best gag of the of the whole the whole thing as well when i was talking about you know when they're entering awards so we'll leave leave people to hear his little punch line that comes in during the show i'm But yeah, it was it was great great to get up there. um Lovely backdrop, you know, with their malt house, all their sort of kills behind them while they while we were chatting.
00:09:50
Speaker
um So if you do do if you are one of the people that watches the show on YouTube, I think it's the the nicest setup we've had so far. Yeah, it's a great chat. And obviously, stu and Brad, they really like to champion people around them. that They're very big on the farmers and and giving a lot of credit to actually what they're getting into the malt house.
00:10:06
Speaker
Love to talk about the breweries they work with doing great stuff. And if you'd like to talk about people in the beer world or connected to the beer world doing great things, make sure you get your nomination in for our Have You Done A Rallys campaign where we shout out the good beer citizens out there all over the country. They could be doing anything.
00:10:23
Speaker
And if you'd like to talk about your favourite brewery as well and get some recognition Behind them, then make sure you enter our Bluestone Yeast Brewery of the Month campaign. So that's at craftypint.com slash bluestone.
00:10:35
Speaker
Yep, and the Rallings one is craftypint.com slash Rallings. I think we're due to pick another winning winner for Rallings next week's show as well. So if you want to get someone nominated, please get them in ASAP.
00:10:46
Speaker
Quick shout out for our beer club as well, The Crafty Cabal. As we mentioned before, we've got Liz looking after that now, doing some amazing work, sort of redesigning what we're doing in terms of our newsletters and social engagement stuff like that. The newsletter for this month has just gone out. We've got giveaways with Carbon 6 out of Brisbane and for Crafted Beer Festival on the Gold Coast, some double passes to give away there.
00:11:11
Speaker
upcoming events for Cabal members at Brewmanity and at Evil Megacorp in Perth when I get down there in a few weeks' time. ah So you can check that out at craftycabal.com. um' I guess which brings us to the main chat um after the break, which means, Will.
00:11:26
Speaker
Yeah, enjoy it. And if you do, make sure you leave us a like, subscribe or review. Cheers. Cheers.
Promotions and Advertisements
00:11:37
Speaker
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00:11:47
Speaker
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00:12:02
Speaker
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Festival Announcements and Invitations
00:12:13
Speaker
or visit placket dot com that's p lla double k it t dot
00:12:22
Speaker
Hey beer lovers, limited tickets are still available for the Point Break Brewery Invitational Beer Festival on Saturday the 16th of August, brought to you by the legends at Blackman's Brewery in Torquay.
00:12:34
Speaker
As my good friend Milo Longbottom reports, it's the Surf Coast social event of the season. An epic day of really good beer, great people and amazing vibes. There's a rockstar line-up of breweries hitting the red carpet, including Rocky Ridge, Garage Project, Kaiju, Banks, Schlenkerle from Germany, Bright Brewery, Hop Nation, Bridge Road Brewers and Goodland.
00:12:57
Speaker
Not to mention live music, delicious food and non-stop good times. Last year's event was a sell-out success and you'll be kicking yourself if you miss this one. Get your tickets now at blackmansbrewery.com.au
00:13:15
Speaker
you and brad thanks so much for joining us yeah thanks for coming out well do you want to start there and tell us a little bit about where we are this is a beautiful part of the world yeah yeah so we're um right now we're situated in the the marquee at the witten malt house which is this um know beautiful um hospitality tourism facility that we're really lucky that we get to to sit alongside with our malting facility over over in the back. You can see some of the some of the tanks and of our germination vessels um there. So we're in a little town called Whitten, right in the heart of the Murmidge irrigation ah area in the Riverina, ah southern New South Wales.
00:13:55
Speaker
Yeah. um And I guess going in a very simple sense, what is what is Voyager? What is Voyager craft malt? you want to answer that one more? um um Yeah, we're an on-farm craft malting facility.
00:14:10
Speaker
We you yeah work with growers, source a wide variety of of grains and malt them for the craft brewing industry, craft distilling and artisan baking industry as well.
00:14:26
Speaker
Yeah. and um And it's your baby, the the two of you. But I guess going back before Voyager, like you two aren't just business partners. You've known each other since you were like, how old you were neighbors? Is that right? Your family's had neighboring farms or something? Is that right?
00:14:41
Speaker
yeah Yeah, we've been yeah been best mates from ah from young age, went to school together, grew up playing sports. Yeah, was it a central, Brolin Central School. So kindergarten through to three d year 12. Went to school together, grew up neighboring farms, yeah playing sport, riding motorbikes, went to university together and um yeah now in now in business together.
00:15:03
Speaker
And studying stuff at uni that would have led to this or did you heading in other directions? Yeah, no, definitely for me was another direction. I studied um finance, accounting and finance at university and some of those um has been helpful in in running a small business.
00:15:23
Speaker
Stu studied design technology, which certainly came a handy a lot i'm designing designing all our malting equipment, um but not specifically, we we didn't have that stage of our lives anyway. We didn't um we didn't know we were going to be going down this path.
00:15:39
Speaker
And did you think you'd come back to the town you grew up in or the area, or did you sort of both have visions of leaving at some point? I probably did. Yeah. I guess I was, um, yeah I was lucky to be, uh, gifted 50 acres for my 12th birthday of a yeah about family farm and, uh, farming was kind of all i ever known and all i really wanted, wanted to do um, growing up.
00:16:02
Speaker
ah yeah During the millennium drought it wasn't a great time to be be farming and kind of the writing was on the wall i guess for me that the farm wasn't going to support mum and dad and and and myself going back to it. So I looked to go and do something else in the meantime.
00:16:17
Speaker
um with always the The plan was always to go back to the back to the farm. um and the The design technology degree I did was essentially to let me teach at tapes and colleges night time so I could work on the farm during the day. and um yeah Things kind of changed when we got to uni and met a girl that became my wife. but um Myself and Brad also got into, we're very competitive, myself from and Brad.
00:16:41
Speaker
We've done a lot of things together but we've got into into home brewing. Uh, and it was just kind of trying to outdo each other and, uh, ultimately led to yeah, making some molten, um, yeah, starting a molten. Oh yeah.
00:16:53
Speaker
you manage be ah yeah just I won the most awards at national levels on home brewing front and and then we changed tack to malting from there. So I'm not sure what happened there. What were your specialty beer stars?
00:17:07
Speaker
Brad won. I think he won three trophies with the one beer that he entered in three different different categories. Has the beer come back on a commercial scale? ah Have you lent your recipe to anybody to you know make it make it happen? I couldn't even recreate it myself after many, many attempts. We actually, like, getting into malting, we were kind of, know, one of the, I guess, advantages for us was that we we thought we were going to be brewing all the time. We're like now we're testing every batch of malt. We're going to be doing so much brewing. And i think I'm...
00:17:34
Speaker
I've brewed once to show one of our our staff members and i think you've brewed ever since, since then we just haven't had time. and But wasn't the plan when you came back here to open a brewery and then you, you, you with your finance background went mate, no, is that right? We did do a, uh, a bit of a, um, a study over the, sat down over the weekend and ran some numbers with another friend who was a brewer as well. and uh yeah it's just the tyranny of distance and and this is back before know crafty was huge it was probably 15 years ago 20 years ago um and yeah we couldn't make it work out out where we are um but then know at the same stage the craft
00:18:13
Speaker
craft malting industry in America was starting to take shape. They formed a guild over there and um it looked like it was evolving into something and and was sort of thought to ourselves, we're in the prime barley growing area of of Australia here. We know a lot about grain handling and and growing good barley.
00:18:32
Speaker
Maybe that's focus that we should look at. I think we kind we kind of got our brewing fix through the Breland beer project as well. Like that was, I guess, a good, you know, feasibility. So when, you know, Brad ran the numbers and we we just can't make this work. We were still fairly committed to to really wanting to to champion the local barley that had been growing and taken it through, you know, to a beer. And we thought that, you know, maybe if we we crowdsource this and, you know, Breland's population of 300 yeah um and we ended up raising nearly close to 50 000 just through the local community saying hey look if you can give us some money we can we'll put we put together a non-for-profit organization and we we set out this mission of taking some local barley um getting it put into it to appear for our community and really telling that story of of provenance and the farmer and we kind of soon discovered in that process that there's just no There was no real opportunities to go and get a ton of barley molted somewhere. and um yeah so Everything that was being grown then was being transported you know hours and hours away to be molted and then yeah moved on wherever wherever else. here Yeah, that's right. yeahp
00:19:41
Speaker
yeah so um Yeah, so we we yeah've launched that beer and it's still brewed today. You can get it at the cellar door here behind us. um But I guess that would that played a big part in in us now eventually um yeah creating that opportunity for yeah that we did for Borell and Beer for other brewers and and distillers and and bakers being able to tell a story of provenance and um yeah. yeah And how how soon from the the fundraiser did you move on to launching, I guess, the first stage of Voyager?
00:20:11
Speaker
It took a couple of years. There was a lot of research went on in that period and we travelled around a bit and internationally and nationally and and spoke to a lot of people and Yeah, probably probably evolved over a little while. We started building our own equipment that Stuart designed out in the farm and and and doing some trial batches and things to work out if if we could make it work. and And then- And you were teaching at the time, is that right? what What were you doing, Brad, while this was happening? Yeah, I was working in finance while we were backgrounding all that.
00:20:42
Speaker
and That's right. yeah and And then, yeah, it must have been 2016 that we bit the bullet and and jumped in head first. Yeah. and um for And that was very close close to where we are now. Is that right? You put the first shed in?
00:21:00
Speaker
Yes. It's just behind us, probably five kilometres away. Yeah. And there's ah yeah a bit of a story on how we got set up at this location. My my wife was in a mother's group meeting with, um probably complaining about our obsession with starting this malta house. I was going to say, what what what did people think when you came to me and said, like, we've got this vision to like, you know, build this malting operation here. So your wife was clearly quite sort of down on the idea. She's probably just sick of hearing me hang on about it. But there was another another member of the mother's group.
00:21:33
Speaker
um who worked out yeah not far from where we are now who ah knew of a ah site that had been built originally for an ethanol plant which is similar in a lot of ways to to a malting facility and and it didn't go ahead but the the structure was there there was a lab set up and there was um you know silos there and a way bridge and and a lot of um grain infrastructure and then right next door was a stainless steel manufacturing business all tied into one so we came out and and had a look and couldn't believe our luck, you know, half an hour from from where we live sort of thing is a facility that's waiting, ready to ready to be turned into a malt house.
00:22:11
Speaker
Yeah. And what was the intention? i mean, you're saying, you know, but you saw an opportunity to, guess, produce small batch malt. Was there a vision beyond that? yeah know, was it like, oh, we can do something more for the region? Or at that time, was it like we we can offer something that's more tailored to, you know, small breweries or what have you? Yeah, I...
00:22:32
Speaker
don't really really know we had had much of a plan like i think it was it was more so can we do this can we design something can make some molt and then it just kind of evolved from there really i think we kind of sat down and said we need to make x amount of tons and get to here and here it was like you know i think if we design a system like this i think it might work and then we did it it didn't work and then we'd change it and try again and we just kind of kept on making mistakes and changing things then before we knew it we had You know, we're supplying half a dozen breweries and they were kind of then relying on us because they'd designed some beers around what we'd done. And then we'd, you a few more customers would come on and, and you know, we need to we need to expand and put another system in to try and keep up. And great that's, yeah.
00:23:11
Speaker
I guess the driver though, like we did talk to a lot of people and brewers that we knew in the industry and and there was a... i genuine interest in knowing where their malt came from, suppose. And that's something that we thought we could do really well on ah um quite a small scale because we can have that say segmentation and provide and and, you know, and still today, malt that goes out still references the area that it was grown from. and And that's something that we started very early on. And Brewers really appreciated that, being able to tell the story of the farmer and the location of where that grain came from in in their beers. and
00:23:47
Speaker
And they often come out to meet the farmers and stuff, don't they? Like that there's sort of a full connection there ah for a lot of those breweries now.
Educational Initiatives and Community Connections
00:23:56
Speaker
Yeah, definitely. but end And, you know, having this facility next but next door to us, you know, like the villas that we've got that, yeah you know, you stayed in last night, like it's such a unique experience to, you know, to have them get out of the the daily grind of brewing and, know, come out here for for a night or two away and get out and meet some of the farmers and and see, you know, just the the passion that some of these farmers have. but You know, we know how passionate our brewers are in general to see growers that have got the same passion ah that they do. And, you know, it's, it's, yeah, it's it's kind of,
00:24:26
Speaker
probably one of our first and one of my proudest achievements is that, you seeing that that connection between that, know, putting so a smile on a farmer's face and giving them some purpose and and some meaning in in terms of what they do. um Yeah, it's it's it's a pretty unique opportunity, I guess, that we've created for for brewers and farmers to meet.
00:24:45
Speaker
How did you find your first brewing customers like Were you involved in industry in some other way? Like how did you bring lots of batch and wildflower on board in the first place? We're both members of the Canberra Brewers Club, which has been a pretty amazing breeding ground for some of the brewing industry now terms of the people that have come through the Canberra Brewers there. But so we had some some connections through that. But yeah, the guys at Batch Brewing were probably and Topher was working with them at the time.
00:25:17
Speaker
um I'm not sure how they just reached out to us and, you know, they basically we could make one ton a week in the early days and they agreed to take one ton a week and provide us feedback and really work with us to, you know, we, you know,
00:25:31
Speaker
Oh, a great deal to to the work that batch did in the early days, you know, sticking by us and and taking some pretty ordinary mold at times. And yeah, you know, and sort of this day, we, you know, still a great relationship with getting the guys at batch and, you know, they come down here here fairly often and um hang out. So it's been a great relationship through there. And then i was it was just word of mouth, I guess we we kind of um one we didn't really in the early days have the production capacity to supply too many other people.
00:26:00
Speaker
um But, um, yeah, we just kind of word spread and we take on a few more and where where were you getting the first batch, uh, first lot of barley from, was that from yours from, there from, from my, from, um, so, um, back then, uh, the 50 acres while i was, I was growing some older kind of unique varieties and, um, what were you doing with it before you could molt it yourself?
00:26:26
Speaker
were were you sending it off elsewhere i when you've grown the barley or yeah yeah yeah growing other cereal cereal grains barley at times um wheat as well yeah so um i'd say how how much of a gift is being given 50 acres it sounds like a hard work 12th birthday present it's not like getting a nintendo switch or something like that uh yeah i use this joke quite a bit most probably have heard it before but it's kind of be argued that it was yeah it could have been more a form of child abuse 50 acres right before 10 years of drought i remember the the the first year i had it i was 12 and and grew an amazing worker and then mum and dad they didn't um give me any any assistance was like here you go you're going to make some mistakes but you'll you'll learn from that yeah
00:27:12
Speaker
And the first year grew a bumper wheat crop, uh, and grossed about, I think $12,000, which was a lot of money. yeah it's a a lot of money today, but for a 12 year old kid to have that kind of money back then. Um, and, uh, I don't even know what I spend it on. Like I was, only ice creams or so I do have this whole memory of the Berlin show, um, of me just being the man giving out dodging car, left, right, center. Um,
00:27:37
Speaker
And then what followed after that was 10 years of not really harvesting ah a crop at all. So it was a tough lesson to learn as a 12 year old kid to put some money inside for the the yeah the bad times. What did you get for your 12th birthday, Brad? ah Not that.
00:27:52
Speaker
Not 50 acres. I have no idea. that You go on a dodgem car ride. Interesting. oh actually ah lost the 50 acres to Brad in a state of origin bet one year. Brad goes for Queensland for some reason. And um Yeah, the Maroons beat the Blues and we had a bet of, uh, I had some sheep, I had a, I had a hundred head of, uh, of ewes or something and yeah, I put them up and, and once. So yeah, technically that's more 50 acres.
00:28:18
Speaker
You're the majority shareholder in in Voyager on the back of that bet. Um, and, and have you got about growing? Cause obviously, know, you want one, one, one ton a week and now you've got this, you know, incredible, um, you know, operation behind you, but it's got in a number of stages, but also pretty rapidly as well.
00:28:34
Speaker
did it was It was a snowball effect and it it started very slowly. It was it was certainly, and I'm sure any small business will will say the same thing, but the first 12 months, two years was was really, really hard work and we had a lot of ups and downs and and many more downs than ups. yeah um and then And then from there, um things started to, yeah as that snowball gets bigger, it's sort of gained its own momentum and and things started to improve. so We, um, we stepped up production capacity, uh, yeah, a few times through that, through those stages and still with your own design and built machinery. Yeah. That's still, yeah.
00:29:14
Speaker
Um, back over on on the original site. yeah Um, and then, and then eventually got to a point, um, to, to do a greenfield site and and expand out, uh, in a significant, um, expansion. Yeah.
00:29:28
Speaker
Yeah. And how much are you doing a week now from one ton? Uh, close to 150. Yeah. Yeah. It's, um, if yeah it's um It does seem like a bit of a a blur now, but thinking back to those those early days, like it was it was tough. I think for a couple of years that years there between myself and Brad, one of us was on site nearly 24 hours a day, seven days a week, all year round. We didn't have the automation or control we have now, so we had to be there monitoring things. you know it's It's a living, breathing yeah entity molt, so you've got to be there at all hours of the night. yeah We were loading the kiln as well, and it was, yeah, to think back to
00:30:05
Speaker
know the the was certainly tough back definitely like i want what gave you the confidence to raise the the money to go and build something you know this this substantial um i get one of the things we we probably didn't allow for like we're being really passionate about about beer um right from the start but it was probably the the distilling scene like we kind of took us a bit by surprise we for some reason kind of just assumed that distillers wouldn't be interested in what we've got they're after cheap you know ethanol and and they're not going to get that that from us but um you know a ton of malt makes
00:30:42
Speaker
you know, 100 kegs of beer, that same ton of malt makes one barrel of whiskey. So you're taking so much product and condensing it down, you you can really start to see any little nuance in grain variety or farming practice or those kind of things. So that was a bit of an opener for us and it really opened up a ah very rapid um rapidly growing market that we didn't really account for. And the distilling industry like craft brewing has gone through some yeah so huge expansion of late. And it was really, yeah i guess, couple of distillers there that um yeah had based some products around some unique grains that we had. And and for for them to get to where they needed to be, we we had to yeah go along for the ride with them.
00:31:22
Speaker
yeah And you mentioned unique grains there, that's been a very central part of the Voyage historic. Can you tell us about sort of the background and why you sort of started, I guess, encouraging farmers to grow either heritage varieties or even going to the seed banks and like experimenting with, you know, either sort of forgotten or historic grains?
00:31:39
Speaker
Yeah, I think probably from what's up here growing up on our farm and and even now I've got a thing I've got a pretty impressive veggie garden. I like to grow a lot of old heirloom seeds and and those kind of things. And tomatoes is a great analogy because you can go and get you know a tomato off the shelf at Coles and Woolies and bite into it and it kind of probably tastes more like ah yeah a potato than it does a tomato.
00:32:03
Speaker
ah Growing these older heirloom varieties, they're just completely different in terms of flavour and and and yeah ah i just it just seemed like a natural progression that that we look at all the breeding that's gone into any kind of agricultural commodity It's all been around efficiency and and all these these great things, but it's it's often been a sacrifice of flavour. and and that's yeah And that's what we do. we're we're not We don't produce bulk commodity malt. We're here to...
00:32:31
Speaker
you so create malts that brewers and and distillers, craft brewers and distillers can kind of leverage off to give them yeah new flavours to work with. And we've just found that um the further back in time we go resurrecting these varieties, the more interesting it is to yeah visually um to even to chew on to um the aromas from it. So it kind of made sense to start going back and from resurrecting some of these older varieties. So yeah, getting from the seeds gene bank and and There's a lot of work that goes goes into it. Remember, yeah planting them into pot plants and harvesting with scissors and then planting them out into a bigger of a veggie garden and then migrating to smaller plots of my 50 acres and then getting up to some yeah some decent volumes now where guys like yeah Chris and Sam Greenwood are able to those.
00:33:17
Speaker
Let's make another but point about these heirloom grains. for For people like Chris that are, you know, Chris actually discovered us wanting to, you know, he heard that we were yeah needing these older heirloom varieties. You know, him in his organic farming system can't use, you know, synthetic fertilizers or chemicals or or nitrogenous fertilizers. So these older varieties grow much better in those farming systems. They compete better with weeds. And so it just kind of, yeah, seems to work well for everyone.
00:33:45
Speaker
for everyone and And then talking of child abuse, tell us how you work with the local school in sort of, you know, getting getting new varieties um scaled up. Yeah. Yeah. Look, that's, that's probably, uh, yeah. Something i'm I'm really proud of actually was that the the amount of work that that was involved in, in playing these trials. And we, we, you know, did it for a couple of years here on site, um, you growing a lot of different varieties. I think we grew, you know, 30 or 40 different varieties of rye.
00:34:11
Speaker
Uh, and there's, there's a lot of work and it, and it's, ah there's a lot of work at, the the time when we're busy is when it's harvest time, we've got grain coming in and and yeah brewers are ramping up. So we've got malt being dispatched and then we've got to go out and yeah harvest these grains with scissors. So yeah, we teamed up with the local local high school here in Griffith High and um in their year 11, 12 Ag class now, the students come and they they take one of the small varieties and they collect keep data on it for us. They plant it, harvest it, bring the seeds back here and um yeah where we can run some analysis on it and go from there. so
00:34:45
Speaker
Maybe it's child labour more than child abuse, I guess. Yeah, yeah. But I think it's great these kids have a damn facility like this and see where grain ends up in terms of baked products and beer and spirits and certainly gets them a lot more interested about the industry and hopefully encourage them to make some good choices around their beer and spirit drinking moving forward.
00:35:11
Speaker
Is there any like variety coming through or anything that you're super excited about or or whether it could be a little bit newer or we we have produced ah just released one at the at the moment called Cape Barley. We've run it a little bit in the past, but Cape is an old six row variety that was um the the variety of that Cascade Brewery in Hobart was using back in 1824 for half a dozen years back then.
00:35:36
Speaker
And some of the the the comments in some old newspapers were that they found it um yeah far better than some of the imported uh malts and some and and what they were using at the time so um we've got a couple of breweries that have been itching to get their hands hands on it we mentioned evan at bendigo um there and uh and and topher with his car scales that he's doing now so um yeah and and it's one that that chris greenwood's been pushing a lot as well because he loves growing it's one that you really performs well on his farm and um yeah in his farming system so yeah So how how are you sort of finding these? Are you sort of talking to the universities and seed banks or are you reading old stuff on newspapers on Trove and trying to dig into what breweries are? Where's it sort of come from? A bit of everything, I guess. um One, the the catalogues that you can get from the seed seed bank are pretty impressive. yeah
00:36:24
Speaker
Some of these are 10,000, 20,000 varieties in there. and Some of them have just got a number. Some of them have got ah you know an interesting, you know a cool name. And some of them have got a bit more data about what it was bred from or um what some issues were from it so it's kind of been a yeah a bit of bit of research a bit of trial and error bit of picking some things that have got a cool name and and do they all work the same way once they get here is is there a similar process in so i guess in simple terms for listeners or viewers like what happens once the grain gets here and what leaves you know
00:36:56
Speaker
ah You know, in terms of these older varieties, some of them, the grain doesn't even even get here. Some of them yeah aren't being grown because they're just yeah complete disasters. We grew some some rye that um just didn't produce any any seed at all. So, yeah, like I think it's a bit of a balancing act as well.
00:37:13
Speaker
Bringing back these, you know, these these varieties, you start off with such a really small amount of seeds. It's then when do you start sacrificing taking some of those grains that you could use to bulk up stock?
00:37:25
Speaker
um to to run through us malt and start doing some sensory evaluations and those kind of things so it is a bit of a balancing balancing act yeah um so yeah they don' all don't make it make it here but um yeah we kind of talk a lot with distillers and brewers about what they're after and what they're interested in and anything that kind of throws some unique traits or characteristics or ones that will kind of earmark and um look to kind of yeah ramp up through through the school. and But you'll take pretty much any grain that will work and you'll do whatever they want to it in terms of smoking as well. You've got a pretty bespoke um offering here.
00:38:00
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And that was that was kind of ah yeah one of the reasons, I guess, in designing our own our own equipment was that we wanted to not just malt barley and we we do rye and wheat and other cereal grains. But we've also run through pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds, um millet, rice, corn, oats. um Yeah, there's kind of no limit to any seed grain or legume that you can malt.
00:38:27
Speaker
Wattle seeds. um Yeah. Yeah. what's and What's the division of labor like, you know, yeah you don't like the talking, they the face of Voyager. brat Brad, like what's your sort of, you know, your, I guess, empire within within the Voyager operation? Yeah, broadly speaking, I manage the production side of things. So the the team that we've gotten and making making the malt and and broadly stew handles the the custom facing yeah so it's a yeah it's a yin and yang that works well for us yeah and in simple terms like how's the production work then you obviously take raw grain comes in and you know what's the yes but i get into too much detail the process it goes through before it's bagged up and sent out Yeah, it's more or less a seven day process, the molting process. So raw grain comes in, it's cleaned, it steeps in water for one or two days, transfers into a germination vessel where it's germinating in there, depending on what grain and what malt we're trying to make, but it can be anywhere between three and six or seven days.
00:39:27
Speaker
And then, so we then we dry that back out to to halt germination halt germination, halt the modification of the the enzymes and the release of enzymes and the modification of the starches and dry that back out. And depending on what sort of times and temperatures we used in the kilning process is gives us different malt flavors as well. So um and then and then the vessels unloaded and reloaded and and we so reset and go again week on week. So that's in a nutshell here, that's the the malting process. And and from there, there the malt gets cleaned, cleaned up again and then either packaged into
00:40:04
Speaker
25 kilo bulk bag or or bulk truck. Yeah. And in the meantime, you've got got a lot of silos storing, I guess, every every every single grain you make as well.
00:40:16
Speaker
Yeah. So that's that's part of the, I guess the the intention of a Voyager being in business was um to create all that segregation and and um that traceability for the for the brewers. And and that was really easy when we were running one tonne a week when we first started. Much, much more difficult now when we're running, you know, multiple batches a week and and much more larger volumes. So, you know, so you'll see behind us that we've got many, many small silos um as opposed to a couple of big, large bunkers or or silos, which, you know, if we were consolidating everything and processing like that, it'd be very different. So um that that whole segregation thing
00:41:00
Speaker
It's a really good thing and something that we're passionate and proud about, but it also causes a lot more management. A lot more management headaches. Yeah, and costs a lot more. It costs a lot more as well. Yeah. And I'd love to come back after the break and have a chat about the wider sustainability and, guess, the impact you're having on the industry and the area here.
00:41:20
Speaker
Before we get to that, though, there's more than just the malting operation here now. you tell us a little bit about the Whitton Malthouse and how that's all come about? you know if creating this know amazing destination within within the region at the moment we're at the the witten multi-house behind that is voyager which is the malting operation behind that is is southern cotton which is a a cotton gin uh and we we approached them to do a a bit of a joint venture and in when we did our expansion at voyager and as part of that they they said we'd like to do a ah little cellar door uh on the side that showcases the the beers and whiskies made with your malt and but
00:41:55
Speaker
And, uh, and that but that was really good. so Great idea. Um, and then each time we had a meeting, there was another idea thrown up about, uh, you know, another function that that could happen or one of, one of the directors of Southern cotton is a mad golfer. So there's a, there's a ah golf chipping, uh, range into the, into the water and,
00:42:15
Speaker
Um, another director is a part of Murray Cod Australia. So in one end of the lake behind us, we've got, um, stocked with Murray Cod that you can, uh, that you can catch, you can grab a fishing rod and reel in some Murray Cod.
00:42:29
Speaker
So, uh, yeah, meeting after meeting and and it evolved into something much, much more bigger than a, uh, you know, a toasted sandwich maker and a coffee machine that was, uh,
00:42:40
Speaker
that was sort of going to be the original plan it's evolved into something that's yeah a tremendous facility and and really designed to showcase um yeah not just not now, not just our um be the beers and whiskeys made with our malt, but also all Riverina produce. And there's there's a whole variety of things that you can get at the Malthouse there that showcase the original.
00:43:02
Speaker
regional things that there are to offer. So yeah, we had to eventually had to stop having meetings because it was getting out of control. of us Yeah, where's the rollercoaster going in? But but as as we're talking, I mean, there's a caravan park going in tennis courts, like they're still ah an evolving beast.
00:43:17
Speaker
It is. And it's crazy to think that was it three or four years ago, this was a yeah a paddock growing, yeah growing grain. for us it's it's kind of I don't still pinch myself coming in to to work every day just how it's it's evolved it's a great asset for the for the region and the and the community yeah you know we're really lucky to have um have it you know situated right alongside you a brain processing facility I don't think there'd be anything yeah in the world that would you know come close to something like like this um But ah the the guys behind Southern Cottoneal, essentially they were yeah four or five farmers that were yeah have really kind of yeah quite entrepreneurial and um you many of them were growing grain for us when we're at the old side and we developed a really good relationship with them there. And um yeah, I think that um thats I think initially the cellar door was kind of our
00:44:08
Speaker
kind of about l yeah we We always wanted to sell it all. like One of the things we learned at the old site was we had this influx of brewers wanting to to come out and visit and see what we were doing. and We had kegerator with 10 tufts outside of it. and yeah so We were keen on having some kind of opportunity for brewers, you know a small little bar for brewers and stills to come down. and and taste what you know um you know malted corn tastes like in a you know in a whiskey or in a beer or or whatever but um yeah it was certainly going to be nothing like this or nothing that was going to be open open to the to the public really it was just something that um yeah we' we're going to have for our for our clients so to have something like this alongside us is uh yeah it's pretty pretty special right well let's take a quick break cheers cheers
00:44:58
Speaker
G'day guys, it's Craig here and we're back breaking down beer styles with Josh from Mogwire Labs and today we're joined by Nick Phillips from the Rube Goldberg Brewing Machine. Today we're talking all things dark beer. It is the Schwartz beer or Schwartz beer, however you pronounce it. I'm not sure.
00:45:17
Speaker
i Mate, Josh, give me the background on this beer style. what What's it all about? Yeah, sure. So, ah I mean, ah the name of the beer, it just translates in German to dark beer. So very, very literal.
00:45:31
Speaker
the The origin of the beer, I believe, comes from Kurzritzer in Germany. um And outside of ah breweries like Kurzritzer,
00:45:46
Speaker
ah in the German region, um it's not an overly popular style brewed throughout the world. So ah in terms of classic Australian examples that do this beer style, there's nothing that really waves the flag.
00:46:02
Speaker
for it But that's ah really exciting, I think. So in terms of the lager movement in the independent craft beer industry here in Australia, with a lot more craft breweries delving into lagers, taking their lager programs more seriously, it means that these breweries are starting to wave the flag for styles like this. as like there's ah there's ah There's a real opportunity there for someone to take the Schwartz beer mantle.
00:46:33
Speaker
Ah, yeah, definitely. And then um I think like a really brief overview in terms of the flavour profile of this beer.
00:46:44
Speaker
It's an easy drinking, dark, dark lager where the the slight emphasis is on making sure that it's just got a bit of slight roasty profile in the in the tasting notes for it. And that's just to help increase ah the drinkability of the beer.
00:47:01
Speaker
Yeah, nice. and Anyway. And, mate, what role, obviously, I think in a lot of roasty beers, yeast plays a really important part. what What does, I guess, the yeast bring to the table here?
00:47:13
Speaker
For Rube Goldberg and Nick's example for this style, they've used our Belvergore Hellers strain, which are is the Augustina strain from Germany.
00:47:24
Speaker
And the beauty of this strain is that it really emphasises a smooth, multi-profile, low ester production and and really ah yeah just emphasises a smooth finish in these beer styles.
00:47:39
Speaker
Yeah, nice. well Well, Nick, let's talk about that. you've um You've got a Dark Beer Festival coming up, is that right? Yeah, we've got our Dark Hats Beer Festival Friday the 1st and Saturday the 2nd here. Yeah, fantastic. yeah Showcasing a bunch of different dark beer styles, lagers and ales. Don't have any Schwarz beer on, but um it is one of our sort of beers that we have on tap very regularly.
00:48:01
Speaker
Okay, so it's almost a ah semi-permanent addition to the lineup? Yeah, permanent as things get here a lot. um Yeah, Shorts Beer is one of the styles that's become pretty near and dear to my heart as well.
00:48:13
Speaker
Yeah, fantastic. And how do you approach brewing that style? Like what's what's your sort of philosophy there? Um, we, well, understanding Schwarz beer, there's there's a couple of, it's a very regional style in Germany.
00:48:27
Speaker
um We model ours off a Thiginian style Schwarz beer, which the Franconian and Thiginian styles tend to be a little bit more balanced with the the caramel malt and the roast, whereas a lot of people think of a more contemporary, what has sort of become a more Munich Schwarz beer, which is the much more roasty, more like what the Kotritzer in Germany is, where it's a very well fermented, but just nicely roasty beer. os Ours is much more of a rounded malt profile and using the Belfergors Helles yeast that just creates such a smooth, easy drinking lager as much as those sort of descriptive words don't describe a lot. But when you drink it, it's just ah a great malty beer.
00:49:09
Speaker
So it ticks all the boxes as as a dark beer lover for me as well. Yeah, nice. And how do you find consumers enjoy it? I mean, it's a little bit of a mind bender when you're telling a consumer it's a lager, but it's it's a rosy malty beast of a beer. how How's the reaction been?
00:49:25
Speaker
Really good. we I mean, it sells fantastically here. We do do a lot more lager styles than I've a lot breweries we really lean heavily into sort of new world lagers and doing traditional styles with newer world malts from places like Voyager and pops from Ryefield but it's one that sells so well here people come in and look for a dark beer we usually have that or Czech dark lager a Tamafe Lysak on and people love them because they they often don't know what they are and you just say what's the dark one and they'll get a Schwartz beer and they always come back for another couple of
00:50:02
Speaker
Yeah, nice. Any kind of um tips or tricks, things you've learned along the way brewing this style? Yeah, um had no you fermentation. um the The trick to any good beer, but particularly with lager styles is to ferment them.
00:50:18
Speaker
You need that really good, healthy, pitchy yeast at the start. You've got to treat your yeast well, re-pitching and... knowing you Even just knowing your vessels and what temperature is best for you, um couple of couple of degrees can make a huge difference to these beers and and throw throw the balance, that malty profile off.
00:50:38
Speaker
If you start to get some of those more sulfur esters come in, it really ruins the beer. You want that smooth, round malt character. That is a great tip. It's all in the fermentation. And guys, if you're listening and you're thinking Schwarzbier, Schwarzbier, however we say it, and i'm I'm hoping I get lots of comments back on how I do actually pronounce it, make sure you chat to Mogwai Labs. They've got all the yeast that can get you set up for success.
00:51:04
Speaker
um Guys, thank you so much. Nick, Josh, really appreciate your time. Thank you. No worries. Yeah, thank you.
00:51:16
Speaker
Welcome back. And do you want to tell us a little bit about grain stock?
Grain Celebrations and Agricultural Impact
00:51:20
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Grain stock is ah is an event where we're running this year, 9th, 10th, 11th of October.
00:51:28
Speaker
um And it's really as a celebration of grain. I guess there's there's two two main reasons for for doing it. And probably the easiest way to describe it is really what we're trying to recreate is what Ben and Maria and HBA have done with High Country Ops. I think yeah anyone in the beer industry knows what a great event and festival that is.
00:51:48
Speaker
um And and yeah putting that spotlight back on uh the agricultural products that go into beer um but for myself going to that festival what i also love about it is the um the benefit to the local economy you know you you can't get accommodation it's it's sold out you know the the the cafes are packed in the mornings you know to to um to have something like that here i think is you based around grain it's at the start of the the grain harvest time a time when we've normally got a lot of breweries coming to visit anyway yeah
00:52:19
Speaker
um So, you one, it's it's really about celebrating um all the fantastic things that are happening in grain. And it's not just just just from us. know, we've got the the support from from yeah Joe Whites and Barrett Burson, who are the first yeah to two major sponsors to jump on board, yeah who have got yeah many growers and and grain receivable sites out here as well. So it's it's really about um celebrating all the work that's happening in that grain space.
00:52:46
Speaker
But the other side of things is is also what we've really wanted to do is just bring our industry together. I think it's obviously a challenging time for ah for everyone that includes suppliers when breweries are hurting, you know, that that that flows further up the up the supply chain.
00:53:00
Speaker
And I don't think there's been a time, you know, that it's needed more in our industry than than now. And we have Brookhawn not going ahead and Good Beer Week. And I think we we kind of yeah need to just come together and realise that, um hey, you know, we're the reasons we got into the industry was because we're passionate about what we do and we love the people that are involved in it.
00:53:22
Speaker
I think those two things haven't haven't changed. So we're really looking forward to posting an event here for everyone to get excited about grain but just have a good catch up.
00:53:32
Speaker
And what's the format of the three days then? So there's going obviously like an industry networking side of things, conference, party, like what's the structure? Yeah. So look, and again, really just following in the footsteps of what High Country Hops have done. So a day of of of tours, visiting You know, trial plots breeding, you know, Australian grain technologies just up the road with their their breeding sites.
00:53:55
Speaker
um The DPI as well with some of their perennial grains, Chris and Sam Greenwoods, and then also visiting grain receivable sites. um And what we're kind of doing so that there will be some yeah tours leaving from here. But as mentioned before, we had some great support from from Barrett's and and Joe's who are sponsoring chartered buses out of the major cities. So the the plan is is that yeah brewers can jump on um jump on one of these buses in Sydney or Melbourne, um maybe visit one of the the malting facilities that the big guys have got there and then yeah make up the pilgrimage out to Whitten via a few farmers and grain receivable sites. It'll be a pretty
00:54:36
Speaker
Pretty good bus. I'm actually trying to work out how I can get to the city and get on the bus to come back out here again. And pick car up somehow. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. And then, um ah yeah, welcome drinks and and a bit of a party in town at Griffith. We've got some yeah great accommodation here, but yeah we're kind of expecting we might might get around the 300 to 400 industry delegates here, keeping in mind that that malt is also used by distilleries and bakeries, so were we'll be opening it to to them as well.
00:55:03
Speaker
um So we're we're yeah hoping that a lot of um lot of delegates will be camped or staying in in in Griffith and we'll have buses bringing them in and out. ah The next day will be the symposium here at this yeah phenomenal facility where we're making use of all the different spaces that we've got here in terms of talks around brewing, distilling, regenerative farming, um all those those kind of things um and be a bit of a trade show as well. um yeah One,
00:55:33
Speaker
Without Brewcon and some of these events going ahead, we really to have an opportunity that suppliers can come and still get in front of brewers and not really have to pay a lot of money to do it. It's not like we're having to hire a huge facility in the city and those kind things. So we're hoping that it'll be really well supported by other industry suppliers as well.
00:55:54
Speaker
And then the last day, at a festival in town, which is really just an extension of the Blood, Sweat and Beers, the festival that has been run in the past. um But it'll focus more around that relationship between grain and the products that grains made from and including the spirits and and yeah fake goods.
00:56:13
Speaker
Can you talk about the music side of things at this stage? Or is that you know too too early in the discussion? um sort of i've got I've got a couple of plans. one One of them is I'm always just amazed at how many brewers are musicians themselves. So I would love to to pull off some kind of a stage where it's ah yeah get up and and and have a play. Dust down the guitars and the decks or whatever. Yeah, yeah yeah but yeah we'll see.
00:56:39
Speaker
I do have a habit of kind of, you know, buying off more than I can chew and um I might have overextended myself already. um ah But yeah in in saying that, um you know, I think what we're really trying to to leverage off is ah running ah the the whole event a bit like a footy netball club where everyone just chips in and and helps out and support we've had from from industry so far has been, know, has been brilliant. People saying, hey, look,
00:57:04
Speaker
um I'm happy to to be a, you know, like ah essentially a tour guide on the bus or I'm happy to come and yeah cook a barbecue or I'm happy to set up some miracle boxes for the festival or, you know, it's it's been really um overwhelming um to to have that that response back from, I guess it's...
00:57:22
Speaker
guess so it's kind of expected it like we know what our industry is about, but it does yeah make you feel really good about the yeah the industry we're working when you've got people putting their hands up left, right and center to help out. So I just I've just got to be better at delegating. And hopefully it'll all be it all all look out.
00:57:39
Speaker
And we've touched a bit on the Greenwood farm and I know regenerative malt will be a part of the conversation there. Do you want to tell us a bit more about whether the Greenwoods and and what they do and and also what some of the farmers in the area doing? Yeah. Yeah. I i think anyone, you know, you guys have have gone and visited Chris and Sam and seen what he's doing there. It's really, know, mind blowing what Chris does. Like it's it's, he is, him and Sam and their family, they, um,
00:58:06
Speaker
Yeah, I still remember the first time I went went to their farm, like and it was even life changing for me who had been yeah growing or farming since I was 12. um
00:58:17
Speaker
I think that that yeah there's a lot of great things in terms of the region ag space that that's happening yeah around a lot of farms here. and I think we really want to try and yeah promote and and showcase that ultimately.
00:58:31
Speaker
um farmers farming in that way need, you know, we need people to buy that product and see value in it. And we're lucky that a lot of lot of brewers, you know, and distillers do see that that value. And for those who are new to the term, you explain what Regen Ag is? And i guess the benefits you see it bringing I guess, well, just to hold the that whole wider region and farmers specifically. um Yeah, well, I guess without getting too so deep in, the easiest explanation is that it's farming in a way that that um enhances the environment, is is is good for the environment.
00:59:04
Speaker
It's more so farmers um focusing on growing their ecosystem or growing the soil rather than growing a crop. When you industrial farming,
00:59:16
Speaker
has kind of all been about how do we grow grow a crop and it's led to you know heavy use of synthetic chemicals and nitrogenous fertilizers and and yeah you could talk about the the impact that that's had on the environment you for a long time but you know there's also impact that it's had on society um and you know something like um you the increase in motor neurone disease over the last 30 years. And here in the river right now, you're seven times more likely to be diagnosed with MND than you are yeah anywhere else. And and it's yeah we're in the food bowl of essentially the food bowl of Australia. Really, we are here like it's it's no no yeah mystery where where that's coming from. yeah
00:59:59
Speaker
So, know, and and and just a bit of a side point, we've actually got the guys from uh um sorry yeah for humanity that um put that know i mentioned to them so they're actually at the the golfing um aquagolf over here running a fundraiser um during the grain stock symposium um we've got uh prizes donated for from some you know some of the great suppliers that we've got in our industry but Brewers can make a donation to um yeah to Brumanity who are going to run that.
01:00:31
Speaker
Yeah, that golfing um for us to to raise some money for and and shed a bit of a light on on M&D, but probably more so the yeah the the the impact that has some of the industrialized farming methods, which kind of resemble more more like mining than they do any kind of know like farming traditional farming methods.
01:00:52
Speaker
um So yeah, so it's something we're really passionate about because yeah this is our home. We live we live here. our our Our families are here. um And you know you kind of see over time the the impact that that that kind of farming has on on the environment, on the landscape, yeah soil erosion and dust storms and and the impact that the flow impact that it has on on on communities. So something we are pretty passionate about.
01:01:14
Speaker
Are you finding that um farmers are looking at what you you guys are doing and maybe the price that you know some farmers are getting for their specialty grains and maybe the more consistent and successful crops the lights that the greenwoods are getting in changing conditions? Are people looking and going, oh, it's going to be hard, but we're going to switch? Are you seeing farmers being willing to try these techniques? I don't think there's any farmer that um yeah enjoys getting dressed up in a hazmat suit and and thinks they're doing a yeah ah great great thing. like um yeah and I think a lot of them have seen over over the time yeah the impact that that that kind of farming has. I don't think any farmer really wants to be farming the way they currently are. I think they all want to want to yeah yeah use less chemical and and yeah produce um better crop in ah in a cleaner way and pass the farm down to to their kids in ah in a better
01:02:12
Speaker
Yeah, a better state than that is at the moment. Yeah. um When we started, we kind of thought that that one of the real challenge, remember talking up one of the real challenges was how are we going to get farmers to grow these all the all the varieties and how are we going to get them to to to grow some of these grains for us? And um the yeah the reality has been that we've we've actually had farmers knocking on our door wanting to ah yeah not necessarily grow old varieties, but want to have a connection to yeah they want their beer in a whiskey. They want to be able to take a six pack of of beer to to you know a Christmas party or to a mate's barbecue and know that their grain is in it. They want brewers coming out, um visiting them on their farm and and yeah
01:02:53
Speaker
um Yeah, it's it's we've yeah, I think I think we play an important role in in showing farmers that there is a market, you know, there is a way for this lot at the end of the tunnel and and so Yeah.
01:03:07
Speaker
And you finding the growing interest in brewers in using these grains as well? Like you've got some pretty, I guess, a sizable list of big and small customers now using you know, the regen stuff as well.
01:03:20
Speaker
Yeah, we do. I think that um there's been a bit of a change of of light in terms of some of our volumes have plateaued out ah in some of those those grains. I think that's purely just because a lot of a lot of the breweries that we work with are just focusing less on wholesale.
01:03:37
Speaker
You know, they're realizing that hey if we if we we just go back to the the tap room, you maybe the the plan that we had at the start, um we've actually got a really viable business here and we can have a bit of fun and we can, know,
01:03:48
Speaker
um so yeah We've got a bit more opportunity to play around with some of these other varieties and and and support regenerative farming practices. So whilst some of the the volumes have plateaued out, we've certainly seen an increase in the amount of brewers that ah that are using some of these grains and particularly the organic and the regen stuff.
01:04:04
Speaker
yeah and And if people choose to buy beers made with that grain, I guess, what's the end goal in terms of, you know, the but benefits for the for the farmers and then the planet? and yeah Because I get, you know, me, you, I'm sure you should brand a few us out there get quite evangelical about it once you understand the benefits it can bring.
01:04:22
Speaker
I think I think the end goal is that it just becomes the but the norm. I think that um and we've come off the back of kind of five really, really wet years. But I think once we throw a couple of dry ones in there, you'll start seeing farmers like like Chris with essentially the the the soils capacity to to hold moisture and conserve moisture in terms of a lot of the cover crops is growing and and yeah the the work he's putting into yeah these sunflowers and these these plants that really open that soil up to to you draw the moisture in rather than just having it having it run off.
01:04:55
Speaker
I think then you'll see farmers like Chris actually producing um higher yields than some of the conventional farming methods. So I think it's important that we're supporting these kind of guys at the moment. So there's some shiny examples when things do get tough and dry and people go, well, it actually works.
01:05:12
Speaker
um now i've i've got the confidence to you know to head down that path as well because otherwise you're basically using fertilizer more and more fertilizer every year and farmers are more aware of that than anyone else aren't they like it it has to go up and up and up yeah and and chemical and and you know we know the the reliance on that and the cost of it's going up as well so you know there's there's also a heavy input cost there as well so i think that um Yeah, I think I'm pretty positive about where things are heading. I think we've got, you know, what Chris is doing 10 years ago, know, and even when I was growing, he would have been seen as a weirdo. People looking out at fence going, what the hell is that guy doing? Like, he he he is crazy. And now there's there's enough conventional farmers looking over the fence going, gee, he's onto something there. Like, look at the crop he' he's grown. He's got, you
01:05:59
Speaker
look at the the you know he's got no weed pressure he hasn't sprayed it he's yeah his his yields are ah comparable to what we're getting in drier years you know i think that there's there's enough little shiny examples out there now that that other farmers are seeing that you know that there's they're onto something yeah i guess aside from inspiring you know farmers to try something different you've been inspiring and helping other molsters as well i know you've spent some time over in wa just spent time over there as well brad like helping other small operations get and running like you guys are yeah Yeah, so we have. So we've done a bit of consultancy work for a few malt houses. One of them particular is the guys at Mallacup Malt over in WA, but ah there's yeah there's no shortage of malters over there now. We've got the Mortlock Malt and Loam as well over there.
01:06:47
Speaker
um Yeah, look, I think ah it... Australia's a pretty unique place in terms that yeah I'd argue that most breweries...
01:06:58
Speaker
wouldn't need to travel too far to be in the middle of a barley field. If you have a look at the grain growing region that stretches all out the East Coast, it's basically where where where breweries are. yeah So we have these this yeah awesome opportunity here that the expectation should be in in maybe 20 years time that you go to a local brewery, they're using local grain.
01:07:19
Speaker
For that to kind of happen, we need local malt houses as well. yeah out now um story was always about utilising local grain and championing the terroir and the provenance and the farmer. and and and that like And when you create that local kind of grain economy, it's it's a great story, but it's it's also great for the local town and the local region and the local breweries. Everyone kind of benefits from it. So it makes no sense that we'd be sending grain all the way across to or sending mulch all the across the WA. They grow um amazing grain there. We can grow amazing grain in most parts of of Australia.
01:07:51
Speaker
you don't see it as creating competition for yourselves by helping these people get up and up and running? I think the same way that a brewery would look at ah another brewery yeah um setting up yeah up the road or another brewery moving into Maracville. Everyone there yeah um encourages that and they see it as is better for everyone. like It raises more awareness about local grain and and um raises that that profile that I really think we don't leverage enough of in beer and the beer is an agricultural product. Like it's got a great story like wine does in terms of passionate farmers and the people behind it all way up the supply chain that are as passionate about brewing beer as brewers are, they're as passionate yeah in their own region, their own
01:08:34
Speaker
and there as well Talking of great grain, you've won two malt cup trophies and in the last few years. Do you want to tell us about that? and you know Brad, in charge of production, is it like breweries where they brew special batches of beer to put into Abers? You're going, I'm going to put extra love into this batch this side this batch of malt going through? or you know happy you know how How did it come about? How does it feel to get those trophies? Every batch of malt gets maximum love. yeah so Definitely not because we forget about the awards every year. I think we've entered three times and we won, was it the best ale malt back 2023, was it? was it more than the year before that? year after that, our samples weren't received and then
01:09:22
Speaker
yeah we've We've sent them in. So we're we're always kind of sending it, you know, leaving to the last minute and sending it. So we we never have the time to kind of brew brew anything special malt anything special. It's normally just pull it poor a sample out and off it goes.
01:09:34
Speaker
Yeah. And, you know, that's good recognition. and And I was over there for the awards this year as part of the the conference they do at the North American Craft Maltes Guild. And that was that was really good. A lot of people doing a lot of good things over there and um getting some good recognition and getting some good feedback as well. I think that's a number one reason that brewers enter beers into, um you know, beer judging awards is to get some feedback and and we do a similar thing. And it's always great to receive that. And and you've had some pretty close relationships with American sort of craft malsas as well.
01:10:08
Speaker
Is that right? and yeah Do you take take ideas from them or are they now looking over here and going, these guys are making the bets more. We need to go and visit them in Witten and see what they're doing. Yeah. um So I'm on the the board of the um Guild over there at the moment yeah and and so try and get over there every second year for the for the conference. And it's good it's good catching up with everyone and over there and seeing what's happening in in in the industry. and ah see where where things are going. They're in a very similar boat to Australia now with craft beer and craft malt as well. beer
01:10:43
Speaker
things ah Things are plateauing a bit there so they're finding other ways to keep moving forward and that's all exciting. I've been to a lot of malt houses over there and that's always a great thing from very, very small to some of the bigger yeah places. but I haven't lured them over this side of the ocean yet.
01:11:04
Speaker
but maybe's talking about Maybe Greenstock 2026 to get someone over here. We had the Richard guys here. They spent spen a in the week here, I think, yeah um guys from Richard. So, um yeah, and I guess just but yeah on ah on on the awards, um not to take any away from Brad and the team, they do a great job malting it. But I ah do feel we've got an unfair advantage in terms of the quality of grain we get to use.
01:11:28
Speaker
we yeah Australia, hands down, grows the best barley in in anywhere in the world. And we kind of get to take, we we use such a small amount of it that we really get to take the cream of the crop and keep that seed segregated. And so we kind of, yeah I do feel we we get a you know ah ah massive, massive head start in that regard.
01:11:47
Speaker
um But in terms of the award, I think it's a great acknowledgement for our farmers. You know, it's as much of an achievement for them as us. I think they get equally excited about knowing that their grain has gone gone into that. So, um yeah, it's great to win those those awards, but, you know,
01:12:04
Speaker
I kind of like to think that it's expected based on that we're doing something wrong if we don't win one because of how great the grain is we get to we get to start with. Do you know how it's judged? Are they biting on it and brewing tiny batches of beer with it? or Yeah, they do. um There's four levels of of judging. So they do, you've got some raw analysis to start with and you've got some sensory analysis on the malt and then you've got, ah they make a little wort and do a full sensory analysis on that and then um the the top fears go in for judging after that. So yeah it's it's it's quite a bit of work and um in the whole process. It's good.
01:12:40
Speaker
is Are there many farmers growing heirloom and some historic grains in the state? states so Or have we if we've got a kind of unique situation growing up around Voyager over here?
01:12:51
Speaker
i think we've got you probably more of and an idea. I think we've got a very, really unique um um place here in terms of the the access to irrigated farmland that we've got around us. Our yeah our background in farming as well.
01:13:06
Speaker
yeah We kind of didn't, you know, having that farming background, the knowledge of of yeah cereal grain growing and then having access to put fields in um you to breed them up, it's probably, um, given us some of advantage and in that space.
01:13:23
Speaker
Um, definitely and I think there's a bit, a bit of stuff happening in terms of corn and some heirloom corn and that over in the, in the States. Yup. Um, I'm not too, a few, few places are doing some breeding with local universities to breed some specific varieties, um, suited to their particular area.
01:13:40
Speaker
Um, so yeah, it's happening over there as well. Yeah. Great. Well, we should ah yeah up wrap up soon because we get to have a tour of the ah of the Malthouse. um Before we do, like if there was one thing you wish you knew when you started Voyager, what would it be?
01:13:58
Speaker
For us, I suppose, I heard a saying that the secret to happiness is solving problems. And theoretically, based on that, we should be the happiest people in the world. Because it just seems that running a small business or starting a small business in a niche market that doesn't currently exist is extremely challenging. And we had plenty of things to deal with as we were starting off.
01:14:25
Speaker
and And I can probably look back now and it's easy in in hindsight, I suppose, to look back and and say, oh, look could have done all those things differently. But just that the attitude of of um of thinking about but embracing these but these challenges and and enjoying them and and rather than rather than letting them get you down or or you know really taking them personally is I wish I probably could have taken a different attitude to all the setbacks and and things along the way, which which yeah becomes much easier the more you more you suffer them, I suppose. They're they're not problems, they're opportunities.
01:15:06
Speaker
Yeah, I guess that's the way that you need to look at it because otherwise it's just too much. yeah So yeah, thats that's probably something that I... reflect i wish on which I knew at the start. Everyone, everyone tells you how hard it is, but you don't realise until until you're in the grind and you know, you're there.
01:15:24
Speaker
Yeah. and What about as as sort of, you know, elder statesman now of the the craft malting industry? um I guess you've been giving this advice to Malacup, but if someone is looking ah what you guys have done, wanting to get involved in doing something similar, would be be the one one one piece of advice you give them as they're starting out?
01:15:41
Speaker
um come visit you georgia yeah yeah yeah good to come and Come and visit us. ah you You've got to be passionate about it. like it's it It's tough, like particularly in those early days. that brad said you no one ever No successful business talks about how easy it was when when they started. like and and I guess for us, it was that it was passion that know that had us out here you know 24 hours a day seven days a week you know shoveling tons and tons of malt and you know like it was yeah it it was tough you you need you've got to be passionate about it if you if you don't have a genuine passion for for for malt agriculture and and beer uh beer and spirits then
01:16:22
Speaker
Yeah, you you it's you're not going to get through it. Yeah. but Yeah. So I guess, yeah, going at it for the right reasons and passion is the number one of those. If if you think you're going to get in it to become get rich quick scheme, certainly, certainly not going to work out well.
01:16:39
Speaker
And what about one wish or dream if you have for the Australian beer industry? probably I've probably got two actually. Can I have two? Yeah, absolutely. You can have as many as
The Brewing Industry's Passion and Potential
01:16:48
Speaker
you want. We should have added the worst one out. No, well one, I think that that um we we leverage the agricultural stories a lot more. I think that it's there's so much untapped potential out there for but any brewer that's using Australian grain.
01:17:05
Speaker
um yeah I think there's some stat like's like 98% of all cereal grain farms are still family owned and dad businesses. So, you know, um that that the work, that the passion that a lot of these farmers have, the the risks and the sacrifices that they make in, you in terms of the the current climate and the environment, trying to grow grain so that we can have have beer, I think is something that hops have done it to some extent, but certainly nowhere near where wine has. you know i want beer to get to the stage where when people think about beer or or think about a brewery, they don't think about a factory, they think of fields of fields of barley.
01:17:46
Speaker
um So I think that that that's probably one of my wishes. And the other one I think is that the brewers don't forget the reason they got into the industry.
01:17:56
Speaker
I think there's you know some of some of that reason has maybe been a little bit blurred over the last couple of years and they've started down some different paths in terms of yeah chasing markets that they probably didn't, you had no plans of it initially. And we're finding...
01:18:13
Speaker
one of the best parts of my job is is talking to brewers day in day out i still take the orders a lot of them over the phone and know normally it's a 20 30 minute phone conversation talking about life and business and and whatever else and um there is a lot of positivity out there at the moment with breweries i think that have realized that hey you know what we've got when we focus just on our tap room know brewing's a lot of fun um you i actually really get a lot of thrill out know a lot of enjoyment and satisfaction at what i do i just kind of hope that that the the indie brewers don't forget you know, that reason they got into the industry in the first place, um which is probably a good way of, you know, coming back to brain stock because that's what it's about. It's like those two things, yeah I've done well there.
Storytelling Through Beer
01:18:56
Speaker
Oh, and I think beer is it's that such a great platform for telling stories as well. Everyone knows beer, whether they drink it or not, you know, and it's such a sort of ubiquitous, you know, and product.
Future Events and Community Engagement
01:19:07
Speaker
So I think, you know, yeah, if we can use beer to tell that that positive and potentially, you know planet changing stories it's a great thing yeah okay yeah so you and brad thank you so much for joining us it always thank you yes
01:19:23
Speaker
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01:19:38
Speaker
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Speaker
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01:20:02
Speaker
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01:20:17
Speaker
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01:20:37
Speaker
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01:20:52
Speaker
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01:21:01
Speaker
Bye.