Stone & Wood Brewing Company

stone brew day (part 1)

June 13th, 2011

It’s all hands on deck today in the brewery for the brewing of our third batch of Stone Beer. For special occasions like this we invite a few special friends along to the brewery to give us a hand to brew this medieval batch.

With a break in the crazy weather and our guests managing to avoid the ash cloud, we got underway at midday with the crew milling the grain.

After a quick burger cooked on the famous brewery BBQ the gang gathered up on the brewhouse platform to start mashing in their freshly milled grain.

Later on we’ll be starting to build a big wood fire to start heating the stones up.

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the wait is almost over

May 28th, 2011

For the last few months we have been frustrated by not being able to keep up with the growing thirst for our beer. Week after week we seem to be working hard at producing as much beer as we can only to see it disappear from under our noses quicker than we can brew it. We’re sure some people are disappointed to see empty shelves at their local store as they go looking for a fresh Lager or Pacific Ale, and we are really sorry that you may have been unable to buy our beer when you were hanging out for one, but thanks for your patience and understanding.

The good news is that our new tanks are due to arrive in a few weeks, and we will be brewing into them within days of them being unpacked.

Being short for tank space has also meant that we have had to delay the release of this year’s Stone Beer. A year is a long time between drinks for those fans of our medieval brew, but we now have a brew day locked in and are planning the party to celebrate the roll out on July the 23rd. We are creating The Festival of the Stone – a night of tunes, art, film and of course plenty of freshly tapped Stone Beer. Stand by for more details in the next couple of weeks.

So the wait is almost over … thanks again for the support and encouragement and we hope to see you at the brewery or on our travels in the next few months.

Cheers

Posted in building mode, events, now brewing | 3 Comments »

it’s good beer week

May 15th, 2011

Yes, there is such a thing as Good Beer Week, and we’re heading to down to Melbourne to be part of the action. The whole week is chock a block full of events that all pay homage to good beer.

We’ll be involved in a number of events such as Brewers and Chewers at The Local Taphouse in St Kilda, Happy Hour at The Courthouse Hotel in Nth Melbourne with the crazy guys from Elbowskin, the Hair of the Dog breakfast at Beer Deluxe at Fed Square with the guys at beermentv, and the Great Beer Debate at Ormond Hall on St Kilda Road.

During the week a special release of our Kellerbier will also be on tap at the Terminus Hotel in Clifton Hill and the Royston in Richmond.

It’s certainly going to be a big week, so if you are going to be in Melbourne, get along to some of the events and enjoy some good beer.

We hope to see you there and share a brew with you.

Cheers

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red receipts & upcoming things

April 24th, 2011

It was never going to be a hard sell, really. To help raise money for flood effected Queenslanders, all people had to do was drink some of our Red Relief Ale, because all the proceeds (apart from the tax) were going straight to the premier’s flood relief fund. With the last of the beer now gone and thanks to the pubs and bars that were good enough to put it on tap, we’ve got a pile of donation receipts that tally over $15,000.

A mighty effort. Cheers to everyone that got involved, especially our good friends at: The Spotted Cow, Grand Central (Bris), Pig n Whistle, Melbourne Hotel, Local Taphouse, Royston, Rails, Montague, Courthouse (Melb), Terminus, Great Northern (Melb), Archive, Wheatsheaf, Yullis, Harts, Earth n Sea, Beer Deluxe, Rusty Water and New Sydney who helped raise the money.

Good beer events…

Hold onto your livers ladies and gentlemen, because May is shaping up to be an epic month for beer lovers. First, we’ll be pouring beers at the first Ministry Of Beer, Craft Beer Festival being held at Archive in Brisbane on Sunday, May 1st. Tickets have already sold out, so if you haven’t got one, start scouring eBay. A short recovery and then we’ll be down in Melbourne for the seven glorious days that make up Good Beer Week. There are too many events to detail, being held across Melbourne and Victoria from May 16-22, so click here for more info. Hopefully see you somewhere along the way.

Save the date…

Brad has already ordered the specialty grains and pulled out his stash of rocks, which means it must nearly be Stone Beer time again. For those that don’t know, Stone Beer is a limited release brew we do once a year, where we throw hot stones in the kettle to help caramelise the natural sugars in the brew.

This year’s batch is going to be a little different from the last two and to celebrate we’re going to hold a “Festival of the Stone” here at the brewery on Saturday, July 23. There’ll be a heap of bands, food stalls and of course the first kegs of Stone Beer. Jump on our Facebook page here for more details.

Tags: good beer week, red relief, stone & wood, stone beer
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staggered and blushing

March 31st, 2011

We’re proud to say that our Pacific Ale has been voted as Australia’s best beer by a panel of respected industry members in The Critics Choice: Australia’s Best Beers, the latest beer book to hit the shelves.

We don’t enter our beer into competitions or awards because our brews don’t fit into the tightly defined pigeon holes that are used to judge them and we just aren’t driven by them anyway. So for our Pacific Ale to be voted the number one beer in the country by thirty nine brewers, beer writers, and bar and bottle shop operators is just a bit overwhelming really, especially given the quality and diversity of the beers that made the top 100.

It’s been five years this week that we have been working on building Stone & Wood and nearly two and a half years since we started brewing. We now have our beers in a lot of the good bars and bottle shops around the country, and continue to work hard at producing beer of a consistent quality that is simply good to drink. We were struggling to keep up with demand over summer so we recently pushed the button on another upgrade to the brewery, which will give us an increase of about 40% in our production capacity.

September 2008 - new toys in the shed

Our Pacific Ale is an example of our philosophy of letting the best ingredients shine through in our beers. Galaxy is a new world hop that produces those renowned tropical fruit characters and Pacific Ale really takes those flavours and puts them out on the stage for all to see.

Getting this type of endorsement from our peers in the industry certainly puts a bit of a spring in our step and we really want to thank the members of the panel for their recognition and the huge number of people who have congratulated us on the win for their kind words of encouragement.

But this accolade and all that we have achieved so far could not have been possible without the support of our small team at Stone & Wood, family, friends, good customers and the many people who have been buying our beer, so to you guys (and you know who you are) a massive thanks for all the help on the ride so far.

Anyway, we need to get back to brewing and introducing people to craft beer, so take it easy and we’ll catch you later.

Cheers

Jamie, Brad and Ross

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a nose full of hops

March 30th, 2011

As we stood on top of a hill overlooking the Bushy Park hop farm just outside Hobart early this morning, the cold rain sprinkled down our backs. With the cold weather moving in the team at Bushy Park has been busy trying to harvest this year’s hops before they start to wither on the vine.

Because a huge amount of the flavour in our Pacific Ale is developed by the Galaxy hops we use, we’ve taken some time out of our busy brewing schedule to come down to Tasmania and see this year’s crop of Galaxy being harvested.

Wandering around the hop vines we were reminded again just how closely linked the art of brewing is to agriculture. Tim Lord from Hop Products Australia took the time to show us around and take us through what his team has had to deal with this season.

We were able to take a close look at the 2011 crop of Galaxy and we can safely say they have loads of that distinctive flavour, including those awesome tropical aromas, that we let shine through in our Pacific Ale.

We’ll be seeing lots more of these hops over the next year as we add them to each brew of Pacific Ale back in Byron Bay.

Until next time … cheers

Tags: galaxy hops, pacific ale, stone and wood
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heading to hobart town

March 28th, 2011

With the hop harvest all but done, we are squeezing in a trip down to Hobart to spend some time checking out the hop gardens at Bushy Park. It will be great to meet with the team down there and get acquainted with this year’s Galaxy hops as they are being harvested. Galaxy hops are a huge part of our Pacific Ale so getting to know more about them and what this season’s crop will be like is an important part of the brewing year at Stone & Wood.

Keep an eye out for updates later in the week as we check out a few bars in Hobart as well.

Cheers

Tags: bushy park, galaxy hops, hobart, pacific ale, stone and wood
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get caught red handed

February 11th, 2011

Here’s your chance to get caught red handed and win a carton of beer. It’s time to roll out our latest brew which we have put together to raise funds for our northern brothers in Queensland who have been belted by mother nature over the last few months.

The dark red ale called Red Relief will make its debut tomorrow (12th Feb) at the Great Australian Beer Spectapular at The Local Taphouses in Melbourne and Sydney, and then flow across the bars of good beer pubs around the country next weekend.

So get involved and help out by simply drinking a Red Relief!

Don’t forget to take a pic of yourself drinking a glass of our latest, post it and tag Stone & Wood Brewing on facebook for your chance to win a carton of our beer.

Check the where to get it page of our website next week to see where it will be flowing.

Cheers

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go LARGE!

February 3rd, 2011

When it’s a hot summers day and you have a cold bottle of Pacific Ale in your hand, there’s not much more you could ask for right? Well now you can ask for more – yes, more of that golden hoppy goodness. We’ve gone large and put our Pacific Ale in 500ml bottles. Just what you needed for the back half of the summer.

We bottled a short run of them this week, and will be sending them out to local bottle shops in Byron Bay and then some good bottlo’s around the country in the next couple of weeks.

Hunt them down, and go LARGE!

Check the where to get it page of the website for stockists.

Cheers

Tags: beer, byron bay, large, pacific ale
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brewing up some relief

January 12th, 2011

After being blown away by the devastation of the Queensland Floods we have decided to do our bit by donating a batch of beer to raise funds for the Queensland Flood Appeal. As craft brewers, we’re not exactly a big corporate with a big bank balance, but we do know that Aussies treat beer like currency, and we can brew beer. We will be working with some of our friends who run great craft beer pubs and bars around the country to raise funds by selling the beer across their bars.

Over the last few weeks and days we have seen the people of Queensland struggling to cope with the full force of mother nature and the rising waters of the big wet.

We’re brewing a one-off beer which was initially going to be a small brew just for the upcoming Great Australian Beer SpecTAPular at the Local Taphouses in Sydney and Melbourne. However we have decided to do a full brew and work together with other good craft beer people to offer craft beer drinkers the opportunity to donate to the cause by simply buying and enjoying a beer.

It’s a way that we as craft brewers, craft pub and bar operators, and craft beer drinkers can all come together to do our bit.

As you would expect from Stone & Wood the beer, to be called Red Relief, follows no real style guide but is a dark red ale brewed with an array of malted grains.

It will be first available at the GAB SpecTAPular on the 12th of Feb and local Byron Bay pubs, and other good craft beer venues around the country the following weekend.

Proceeds from every keg sold across the bar will be donated to the Queensland Flood Appeal.

Here are some shots from today’s brew day.