It’s a coming together of old and new – not to mention a little bit of old dog learning new tricks – as we get around to expanding the Crafty Pint family once more. Today sees us add nine more brewery and venue listings to the site from Western Australia, New South Wales and Victoria. They range from a brewery that’s been operating in the Margaret River region for nigh on two decades to another that’s still producing beer on a 70 litre system while the brewer awaits the arrival of his new brewhouse, plus a selection of classic pubs whose taps just keep getting craftier and craftier.
Thanks to Nick O, AKA New South Wales Crafty, for his sterling efforts in producing the new listings from Sydney. Now that we have a number of trusted scribes outside Crafty’s hometown of Melbourne, expect to see the number of listings growing at a rather faster rate than in recent months. In fact, all being well, there should be another major addition within the next month.
With the number of listings growing, one of the impending changes to the site will see filters added so that readers can search the Breweries, Bars (soon to be renamed Venues with more restaurants improving their beer lists) and Bottleshops directories by state. Also underway in the realm of Crafty Pint tweakage are the introduction of a dedicated page for films, another for jobs, and some other changes that we hope will improve the user friendliness of the site.
In the offline world, the nine new listings below plus the hundred or so already on the site will soon be receiving a door/window sticker like the one to the right below. We hope this little added extra for those venues that have pages on the site will prove useful in tempting drinkers through their doors, safe in the knowledge that they will find Aussie craft beer on the other side.
Anyway, enough of the near future and back to the now. The nine breweries and bars we’re adding today are:
The Fitzroy Pinnacle – Housed inside one of inner North Melbourne’s most eye-catching buildings is a pub that combines a handful of taps pouring fresh craft beer with an impressive bottle list, live music, DJs and a sweet beer garden.
Union Hotel Newtown – A classic corner boozer in Newtown’s King Street that’s been in the same family for three decades and in the past year or so has reinvented itself as the home of one of Sydney’s biggest ranges of draught craft beer.
Young & Jackson – Pretty much the first thing any visitor to Melbourne sees as they step through the main entrance at Flinders Street Station is one of the city’s oldest and most iconic pubs. There are more than 50 taps throughout the building and these days more than 30 of those are dedicated to quality craft beers from all over Australia.
Bootleg Brewery – The first brewery to open in Margaret River, a region that now has more than any other part of Australia, brews an eclectic range of beers that are best enjoyed at its sprawling home in the heart of wine country.
Eagle Bay Brewery – One of the Margaret River’s newest breweries and arguably its most spectacular. Eagle Bay is run by three siblings on a hilltop site that enjoys truly stunning views across the region’s northwestern coastline.
Black Dog Brewery – Fourth generation winemaker James Booth decided that producing all of Taminick Cellars' vintages just wasn’t enough. So he built a nanobrewery, swiftly gained a following for his beers and will soon welcome a brand new brewhouse to his family’s High Country vineyard.
Riverside Brewery – Boldly going where no brewer has gone before – Parramatta – David Padden has wasted no time in winning admirers for his no-holds-barred, numerically inspired brews.
Young Henrys – Less a microbrewery than a hangout for the kaleidoscopic array of folk that call Newtown and its surrounds home that happens to produce cracking beer too. Young Henry’s has rapidly become part of the suburb’s identity, with founder Richard Adamson developing a nifty sideline in rockstar brews too.
