Our two breweries in Byron and Murwillumbah have seen considerable growth over the past 18 months and as we continue to produce more beer than ever before our sustainable initiatives are front of mind.

We celebrate the idea that this is the only planet with beer, a solid reason and one of many to protect and preserve the beautiful environment that we live and work in day to day. As part of our role as the local brewer in our community we must constantly be looking for innovative ways to ensure our practices are sustainable and that we will see generations in the future enjoying our beers in an environment that has been looked after.

Green Feet is a company-wide initiative, a couple of years old that is focused on minimising our footprint. We’re stoked to announce its next step… the installation and operation of plastic baler, which is effectively recycling and reducing our contribution to landfill at the Murwillumbah site.

After being awarded the NSW state’s first rebate for a baler through the help of a collective from the Northern Rivers called Northeast Waste, we immediately set about locally sourcing a twin chamber baler.

As a bit of a background, waste, especially plastic takes up a lot of space contributing to landfill and also carbon emissions by the increased number of times a garbage truck needs to go to and from the tip.

Our sustainability coordinator Tom O’Reilly makes the point, “[…] landfill is a hole somewhere full of our rubbish. It doesn’t just disappear. If we don’t change our doings we’ll end up with more holes of rubbish and less habitat and land to grow food.”

Compressing the waste minimises the space it would usually require and this is achieved through using a baler. However, Instead of sending it to the dump, we truck it up to Plastics Worldwide, a recycling merchant on the Gold Coast.

The addition of the baler to the Murbah site has meant we now recycle 97% of our waste making a realised difference to our contribution to landfill.

“At the start of this project I wouldn’t have expected that we’d get so close to the prospect of becoming a zero waste brewery.”

That for us is just as important as brewing beer that’s good to drink.

WORKING WITH A LOCAL SOCIAL ENTERPRISE TO UPCYCLE OUR WASTE

This year’s Stone Beer that’s bubbling away in the tanks, waiting for when the days are short and the nights are cold, was brewed with eleven different malts. That’s a whole of lot of 25kg grain bags (which is always the case when we use specialty malt for our brews).

For us, it’s always been a question of how we can re-use these bags, rather than send them to landfill. We usually give them to local environmental organisations to assist them in cleaning up the local beaches or to collect plastics from businesses so that they can properly recycle it. We even took to the sewing machine to make cushions with them!

For us, this is how we roll as a business, working continually towards reducing our foot print. This falls under Green Feet, our company wide sustainability initiative that strives not only to reduce, reuse and recycle but also exploring innovative practices by reimagining the ecology of brewing.

Earlier this year, we met Lisa Flower from Waste to Resource who worked with our Sustainability Coordinator to install a baling unit at our Murwillumbah Brewery. The unit compresses cardboard and plastic waste from the packaging line into 75kg bales to be recycled. Compressing this waste means less truck movements and our plastic is now recycled and not contributing to landfill.

Through meeting Lisa, we connected with a local not for profit group call Sort Recycling that she also works with. This social enterprise, based all over Australia, provides skills and training through practical Work for the Dole activities around Australia. Each community-based facility recycles waste close to its source and returns its value directly back to that community.

Through recycling computers, bikes, timber and plastics right through to habitat protection. The organisation creates new jobs, training and economic opportunities for disadvantaged individuals and families.

“We work on-the-ground, in remote, regional and urban communities around Australia. We canvass donations of obsolete computers and other eWaste, wooden pallets, discarded bikes and other things with wheels and plastic items from local households and businesses. We show participants how to fabricate new products from them and then they sell the products in both real and online retail environments.”

The centre based in Murwillumbah has been taking our grain bags and up-cycling them into bags and bunting for us to use at the brewery. This has given a handful of participants the opportunity to develop skills in design and also sewing. We’re looking forward to continuing to work with Sort to come up with ways to not only recycle but upcycle our ‘waste’ into products that are useful for our communities.

For more info about Sort Recycling, check our Murwillumbah’s page https://www.facebook.com/sortmurbah

Our Sustainability Coordinator Tom (third from left) and our Engineering Manager Nick (end right) with the team from the Murwillumbah Sort Recycling Centre – cheers for having us guys!

Celebrating we’re the only planet with beer

Striving for good beer means looking after our Earth. We make the most of the natural ingredients that are available today and they’re expressions of the environments from which they originate. Think clean water, nutritious malt, botanic hops, ambitious yeast: Good environments make for a good beer, it’s as simple as that.

To celebrate our Earth, we’re releasing six new limited release Stone & Wood beers, a London Porter, Czech Pilsner, Belgian Saison, German Hefeweizen, Antipodean Pale Ale and an American IPA, that pay homage to each of their humble beginnings and the influence the environment has on brewing.

Over the years, beer styles have intimately co-evolved with their environments. Be it the roasted malts and bicarbonate rich water of the UK that inspired great dark beer styles such as the Porter to the aromatic love affair between malted wheat and Bavarian top fermenting yeasts that has left us all gasping for more Hefeweizen. How about the ales of the US, Australia and NZ that have been cultivated by new world hop gardeners and brewers together in their lust for pungent fruity hop botanicals.

The ritual of coming together and sharing a few brews is grounded in our world’s history and these beers are a tribute not only to beer but this amazing planet.

While we only ever use four ingredients to brew our beers, many other resources play their part in delivering beer to our drinkers. Energy, glass, cardboard and fuel are a few examples of the other things that come from environments to support the journey from grain to glass.

We acknowledge the reliance we have on our Earth to enable us to produce good beer so it is our responsibility to tread a path towards sustainability through our Green Feet program.

Green Feet is a company wide program we’ve been working on for a couple of years now. It’s about minimising our foot print on the Earth through striving not only to reduce, reuse and recycle but also exploring innovative practices by reimagining the ecology of brewing.

We have a number of initiatives that are already underway or implemented including:

• The instalment of 480 solar panels at our Murwillumbah site. This system will significantly reduce our grid-based electricity demand (by at least 40%). This reduction is the equivalent to the electricity used to power 20-25 homes.
• The instalment of LED lighting in workspaces. Lighting now uses a quarter of the energy, equivalent to taking 7 cars off the road.
• The instalment of a baling unit which compresses cardboard and plastic waste from the packaging line into 75kg bales to be recycled. Compressing this waste means less truck movements and our plastic is now recycled and not contributing to landfill.
• Our water to beer ratio (water: beer) is fantastic. Whilst the industry average is 5:1 our ratio is 3:1 (it takes 3L water to produce every 1L of S&W beer.). This can be attributed to not only our beer being handcrafted but we also maintain our brewery and packaging line by hand, ensuring we have control over the amount of water we use.
• Our water to beer is soon to become even better since we are poised to install infrastructure to harvest the water used to rinse bottles before filling. This rinse water will be collected into tanks so we can use it in other areas of the brewery for tasks such as cleaning.
• Our grain bags are up-cycled into bags and bunting by the community based recycling organisation SORT.org

… And with us continually working towards being sustainable, this makes our beer now even easier to drink!

 So raise a glass and celebrate we are the only planet with beer!

The Beers of the Earth are going on tap and landing on shelves across the country from 30 March – here is where

BEERS OF THE EARTH – TASTING NOTES

 London Porter

Porter is the original urban ale, getting its name from the 1700’s equivalent of white delivery van drivers who loaded and unloaded the ships, moving goods around the city. Its silky charms made this dark brew the pint for the people.

Toasted and roasted malt with a fruity aroma of prunes & raisins and earthy English hops, followed with a dry and satisfying finish. 5.1% alc/vol 25 IBU.

Czech Pilsner

After the brewers of Pilsen watched helplessly as their barrels of contaminated ale flooded the streets, they enlisted the help of a Bavarian brewer and his lager yeast. Throwing in Saaz, the most noble of hops, a new light coloured beer was born that would become an international favourite.

Rich sweet malts, balanced with lashings of Czech Saaz hops adding a soft yet assertive bitterness. 5.0% alc/vol 40 IBU.

American IPA

The American IPA emerged on the West Coast during a 1980’s beer renaissance. Using strains of hops that imparted a more fruitier, resinous character than their English equivalents, this style of beer has influenced a whole new generation of hop heads from the States and abroad.

Deep marmalade colour from the American ale & crystal malts. Upfront citrus with a piney aroma from US hops that deliver an outrageous bitterness. 8.2% alc/vol 75 IBU.

German Hefeweizen

In 16th Century Bavaria, the local royals allowed the use of wheat in addition to barley despite the restrictions of the Reinheitsgebot. The aromatic cloudy Hefeweizen became a favourite Summer quencher.

The German yeast creates the cloudiness and the fruity banana and spicy characters typical of this style. Delicate yet complex with a refreshing acidity. 5.4% alc/vol 12IBU.

Belgian Saison

A farmhouse ale brewed seasonally in Autumn through to early Spring, revitalized the weary who worked under the searing summer sun, satisfying their thirst. A true utilitarian beer and an ultimate refresher.

Golden in colour with the complexity of yeast spiciness, white pepper and citrus. Firm bitterness and very dry finish. A thirst quencher. 6.8% alc/vol 36 IBU.

Antipodean Pale Ale

Whether it’s grabbing a six pack for a backyard BBQ or meeting your mates at the pub to watch a band after a surf, this refreshing ale, brewed with a new generation of Antipodean hops is the quintessential beer for a Southern summer.

Lush tropical floral aromas created by blending NZ & Australian hops lead to a clean malt & refreshing dry bitter finish. 5.1% alc/vol 42 IBU

There’s been a lot of noise and chat over recent times about a word that seems to get far too much attention. Whether something is or isn’t or what the word should or shouldn’t mean, and whether a brewer or a beer is or isn’t.

We find it a little strange that elements of an industry that pride themselves on being different want to be put in a pigeon hole and be defined as something.

We think the industry has gone past its ability to define things. We have to let the drinker define what they like and what they value.

If you want to be tagged as a ‘craft’ brewer, then you have to walk the talk. Being a member of an exclusive or inclusive “craft club” won’t help.

Our thinking is that you just have to put your head down and arse up and brew good beer, behave so people build trust and respect in what you do, be authentic, be transparent and look after your customers and drinkers … if you do that, then people will support you, and they may even assign the tag ‘craft’ to what you do…if you want them to.

We don’t think you can BE a ‘craft’ brewer, you can only be described as one by other people, based on their perspective of you and their own personal meaning of the term. Let’s face it people have their own frame work and beliefs that will dictate what their own personal thoughts and meanings are when they use a word to describe something.

At the end of the day though, it’s a description that needs to be earned, it can’t be self proclaimed.

For us at Stone & Wood, we don’t really get caught up on whether we fall into a subcategory of the brewing industry or an imposed definition of a word, we just strive to be a good brewery, being a good team, brewing good beer for good people, and doing good for our community.

Sure we use the term handcrafted to capture our hands on approach to brewing, and to help people understand the variability of our beer, but it’s only a meaningful term if you live and breath it, and if people see the value in it.

It’s time the industry and its commentators moved on and focused on the many positive things that are going on in an industry that is transforming at a rapid rate.

After all we have the freedom to brew and drink whatever we want, we have the freedom to run our businesses however we want, and drinkers have the freedom to have their own opinions.

Trying to impose opinions and definitions on people works against the very freedom we have worked and fought hard to establish.

But as brewers who ask people to voluntarily pay their hard earned cash for our beer, we will all live and die by how we behave and people’s appreciation of the quality of our beer.

So let’s take time to reflect and enjoy what we have all created and how much growth and momentum there is behind the seismic shift taking place in the beer world.

It’s Australia Day weekend, so let’s just blow the froth off all this and celebrate all the good things with a good local beer.

Cheers

Jamie, Brad and Ross

Gifted with a kilo of Galaxy, a Brissy home brewer concocts eight beers inspired by the recent Tour De France and throws a party to raise money for charity…

As the last hops were being plucked from the bines down at Bushy Park in Tassie, as a part of our Ingrained Community Program,we were bidding in HPA’s ‘Premiere Crop of the Hops’ Charity Auction. With 100% of the proceeds going towards fighting depression and men’s health with beyondblue, the auction raised $10,000. We came away with 10 kilos of the freshest Galaxy hops and decided to give it away to home brewers to pack some punch into their next brew.

For the chance to win a kilo of it, we asked home brewers to describe how they would continue the fundraising love for a charity of their choice and do their own ‘Karma Keg‘. One of the winners, Daniel Angus and his brewing partner Michael, well and truly took this to the next level, holding their own version of our Karma Keg last weekend called ‘Tour De Keg’.

The idea was an adaptation from an event him and his mates threw last October, called Octokeg, where they filled eight kegs and threw a massive party with proceeds going to Plan International. Armed with a kilo of Galaxy and coinciding with the Tour de France, they brewed eight tour inspired beers and planned the unveiling last Saturday with all money raised going to the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre.

Dan has been a home brewer for 10 years, starting off kit brewing but then moving to all-grain brewing about 5 years ago.

“I have a passion for hoppy American style Ales, but try to mix it up as often as I can,” he said.

“[Having the Galaxy] encouraged me to try to reinvent some classic styles. The saison with Galaxy worked particularly well, with the tartness from the French saison yeast mixing well with the passionfruit of the Galaxy. I’ll be brewing that one again!”

Just some of the beers brewed included the The Gutiérrez Gluten-free Pale Ale, the KOM Red Ale, Stage 5 Saison and a Richie Porte Port Porter.

“The American Red Ale proved to be the most popular early in the night, and was replaced by the Robust Porter which given the cold night went even faster, particularly given that my wife Kath had made a chocolate cake to pair with it.”

With 80-100 friends and family packing into Dan’s backyard, by 1:30am (nice effort) the donations jar was brimming and we are told the crew raised $1105.70!

Good on you guys, we’re stoked to see that the fundraising love was passed forward and even more so that some great beers were able to be born and shared with the addition of that special little hop Galaxy!

We draw our Pacific Ale from the tank and straight into a bottle (or keg) without filtering or pasteurising it so you can enjoy our beer in the same condition we do when we try it from the tank at the brewery… simply fresh.

But to make sure you’re hit with the full flavour and balance of our Pacific Ale, you need to give our bottles a special swirl…

That’s because after all the yeast’s hard work in the fermenter, she needs a rest. Once in the bottle she relaxes a bit and settles to the bottom. By giving the bottle a swirl during pouring, the yeast is roused back up into the beer adding a pale golden hue that gives a glowing haze when held to the light. This makes our Pacific Ale, simply good to drink. 

Film by Gorilla Films

The smell of the fresh green Galaxy Hops hits before you reach the Bushy Park gates. Before the long vertical vines hanging from the trellises lining the fields that disappear into the distance are visible, you’re welcomed by a punchy, zesty aroma that lifts you above the previous evening’s haze.

Ah Galaxy, she’s a late bloomer. She matures after the other varieties cultivated by Hop Products Australia have been harvested and sent on their way but as we pull in, we can see she’s ready. Evenly strung along the wires like threads on a loom, her now tightly formed hop cones are waiting, as if in line, for harvest. Our Brewers Brad and Nic were in heaven.

“I was overwhelmed by each bine carrying almost enough finger sized Galaxy cones for a batch of Pacific ale,” Nic reminisces.

Coming to Tassie to see the protagonist of our Pacific Ale, is like a pilgrimage. This hop has become the most internationally recognized Australian variety and is responsible for giving our most popular beer its distinctive aromatic tropical fruit and citrus flavour.

Once upon a time, these same fields were planted with only bittering varieties but over the past 5 years, with small-scale brewers decidedly wanting to produce more than crisp, dry lagers, HPA are investing in providing new cultivars to produce top quality hops that bring new flavours to quality beers. Of this year’s crops, over 40% are new proprietary flavour and aroma hops and HPA predict that this will rise to 80% within a few years. This is something that makes us weak at the knees!

Following the tractors, headlights still on in the early morning light, carrying the bouncing bundles of bines towards HPA’s processing facility, Tim Lord – Managing Director and Owen Johnston – Sales and Marketing Manager walk us through the process that the hop cones take, being stripped from the bine, sorted from the foreign matter and laid in the kiln.

For our Brewers, this is like Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory. Hooks trailing bines, conveyers whisking the cones on and upward, through and around in a controlled flurry surround them and all the while that botanical fresh smell abounds.

The Galaxy hop is an ingredient they work with every day and yet when they open a new bag to add into the kettle or dry hop into the fermenter, they don’t tire of the smell and never wish to decline at least a taste.  Nic was hoping the smell of the fresh hops would stay in his clothes for the trip back across the Tasman.

So with this 2014 release, the Brewers just couldn’t resist creating something a little special and with good timing for this week’s Brewsvegas in Brisbane. The lads have brewed a fresh hopped New Season Pacific Ale. Because the driving force of flavour in Pacific Ale is the late dry hopping in the fermenter, we are able to supplement and complement that with a very late “wet hopping” by dunking a few massive bulging bags of freshly picked Galaxy hop cones into the tank giving them a good 24 hours or so to give the beer an extra fruity resinous wack!

For us, producing these two limited releases isn’t about creating something better, it’s about creating something different. Creating something that embodies our philosophy of making the most of ingredients that are fresh today and keeping it simple.

If you’d like to taste the Galaxy hops in action, buy Pacific Ale online.

Of course, Tassie is a long way from the warm waters of Byron and so it only made sense to catch up with a few friends, share a couple of beers and enjoy the great local food and also throw in a bit of culture….

To the guys at Moo Brew, thanks for showing us around and for taking us down into the underbelly of the art world at MONA.

Hobart and its surrounds are buzzing with venues and wineries offering great food, impressive tap line-ups and world class wine. With our tight schedule, deciding what we would have to miss was difficult.

And to Bill and Chris from Lark Distillery, it is always a pleasure seeing other passionate people putting the same kind of priority on quality and embracing the handcrafted element of producing their product. The tasting of your whiskeys is worth savouring, even if it was 10am in the morning…..

Stone & Wood x McTavish – The craft of brewing and shaping

We’ve taken a different approach to the traditional brew to style model. We make handcrafted beer in a part of the world where people enjoy having a beer when relaxing after catching a wave, catching a band at the pub or just catching up with friends. We shape our beers to compliment these local conditions.

Co-Founder and Head Brewer Brad Rogers of Stone & Wood used the feeling of coming straight out of the water on a Summer’s day, with boardies still dripping, running across the hot sand, past the sunbakers, over the grassy knoll and straight into the beer garden to grab a beer that would satisfy that insatiable thirst to create our Pacific Ale…

Brewing as a craft takes a connection to the community, applied skill, experience, creativity and knowledge. Likewise, so does shaping a surfboard.

Godfather of surfing and pioneer Bob McTavish, founded McTavish back in 1962.  Still surfing everyday, his connection to the industry, the local area and innate understanding of how to shape a board for a certain break and ability have ensured his surfboards have remained the benchmark.

While both enjoy creating things, the real connection between the craft of brewing and shaping is the shared passion for using them.

Thank you to Bob McTavish and the McTavish team www.mctavish.com.au
Film: Rest Your Eyes Production www.restyoureyesproduction.com