May was a big one on every front. There was plenty going on personally, but I want to keep this to the good stuff happening across the industry, because there was a lot of it.
Bintani Trade Day
I spent the Bintani Trade Day catching up with brewers from all over. It is one of those days where a few hours of hallway conversations get you further than a month of emails.
The beer of the day was a cracker. Joe White Maltings marked 100 years of specialty malt roasting, and to celebrate it Stomping Ground brewed Victoria Street Bitter. Joe White made their first specialty malt around the corner from Stomping Ground’s Collingwood home, on Victoria Street, before the specialty plant moved to Ballarat, so there is a nice piece of local history in the glass. It is an Australian bitter at 4.8%, bready and toasty with a caramel backbone, and it was tasting really good on the day. A century of roasting is a serious innings, and it was good to see it marked with an honest, malt-forward beer rather than something flashy.
A few other highlights from the day:
- Caught up with Hendo from Rockstar Brewer and got the lowdown on what he has been working on.
- Talked to Justin and Jane about a new beer competition they are hoping to launch this year. The focus is on giving brewers results they can actually use to engage their community, which is something a lot of competitions miss. I am keen to see where that goes.
- Caught up with Sabrina from the AIBAs and heard about the work going on behind the scenes. There is far more effort in running these things well than most people realise.
Brewers and Chewers at Tap House
After the trade day I headed to the Brewers and Chewers event at Tap House. Confession: I had never been to Tap House before. It is south of the river and I do not get down that way often, so I had been meaning to go for years and finally made it. It did not disappoint. The food was excellent, the beer was good, and the best part was sitting with brewers and hearing their stories.
The standout was Ashley Huntington from Two Metre Tall, the farmhouse brewery up in the Derwent Valley in Tasmania. I have never heard a brewer talk like it. It honestly felt like sitting at the Comedy Festival, which was only a couple of months ago, and he would not have looked out of place on that bill. Engaging, funny, and a lot of fun. One of the attendees filmed it, and it is well worth five minutes. Heads up, there is some occasional strong language.
The AIBAs
The main event in May was the Australian International Beer Awards. This year we grabbed a table and invited a bunch of brewers along, and it was a great night.
A number of the breweries we work with did exceptionally well, picking up trophies, gold medals and consistency awards. It is genuinely heartening to watch. These are people who have been grinding for years, and seeing that work recognised by their peers is a good feeling.
Stomping Ground had a stellar night, with Hanging Rauch, their smoky Bamberg-style Rauchbier, taking out Champion Australian Independent Beer, the top trophy for an independent brewery. Last year I missed out on tasting it, but they brewed more this time, so you may still be able to get it at the Collingwood taproom. I got down there last weekend and worked through the Rölsch, their strong Belgian, the Imperial, and a hand pump pour of Victoria Street Bitter, the same Joe White centenary beer from earlier. I had a good chat with James about how it came together, and he let me photograph a page from his brewer’s notebook for it.
The result that gave me the most joy, though, was Kenny from Mountain Goat taking out two trophies. Full disclaimer: we had nothing to do with this beer, our yeast was not in it. But Kenny is one of the genuinely good ones. Any time you talk to him you come away in a better mood. He took the trophy in the IPA category, the biggest category of the night, with Bract To The Future, and then went on to win Champion Australian Beer, which means it stood up against the best of the Australian field. That is an enormous achievement.
What struck me was the whole Mountain Goat team on cloud nine together. You could see how much they like each other, and that is hard to hold onto for years in a big team. It was Kenny’s project, which is why I am singling him out, but hats off to Kenny, Alana and the entire Mountain Goat crew. Well earned.
AIBA’s by the numbers
I got so curious about this year’s results that I pulled apart ten years of AIBA data and wrote it up on its own. If you like a numbers deep dive, the contraction in entries, the quiet rise of lager, and the rarest award on the sheet, have a read: AIBA 2026 by the numbers.
Yusuf went home to Turkey
Yusuf took most of May off to head back to Turkey and spend time with family. Being a brewer through and through, he could not help seeking out the local craft beer scene while he was there, and he came back with plenty to say about it. We have written it up as its own piece, so if you want to know what craft beer looks like in Turkey right now, have a read: Craft beer in Turkey, through Yusuf’s eyes.
A few things to look out for
Over the coming months we are going to make it easier to branch out across our yeast range.
- We will start dropping flavour-profile information into your orders, along with examples of how to use different strains, so you can see what else is possible beyond your usual pitch.
- The classic example: you might be running our New England for your hazies and be very happy with it, but never have stepped up your lager program. Plenty of award-winning lagers have been brewed with our Pilsen, and we want to put those in front of you.
- I am trying to get my hands on some of the Stomping Ground trophy beer. That one is more of a curiosity, but if I manage it, it will go out in orders too.
If you want to change up your yeast across your different SKUs, drop us a line. We will help you work out where to expand.
On dried versus liquid
A lot of brewers reach for dried yeast for the convenience, and it has its place. But if you want to step your beer up a level, the awards make the case for liquid pretty clearly. The breweries collecting gold with our yeast are not only making better beer, they are saving money doing it, because they repitch and get five to ten generations, sometimes more, out of a single pitch.
And it is not one pitch, one beer. A single pitch can be split and carried across a run of SKUs. You might take our Pilsen, brew a draught lager, then a Czech pils, then a dark lager, split the yeast again into a New Zealand pilsner, a West Coast pils, a cold IPA, and keep going. There is a lot you can do with one healthy pitch.
If you want to know more, give us a line.