The Steam Exchange Brewery: With Lisa McAskill in the Fleurieu Peninsula region of South Australia

Goolwa has always been a been a popular holiday destination. But the town really owes its formation to commerce, trade and hard work. Back in the late 1800s it was a thriving river port - where produce from homesteads upstream was transported to Adelaide.

The Oscar W, moored alongside the old wharf is a reminder of the paddlesteamer era. So too is the nearby railway goods shed. Built in the 1870s, the shed was the exchange point for the hundreds of thousands of tons of grain and wool which was unloaded from the river boats and transferred to the steam trains.

That explains the name for the latest enterprise to occupy the shed - the Steam Exchange Brewery. The brewery produces four lines of beer including the "Southerly Buster" - a classic British style beer for those cold blustery days when the south westerlies are ripping through over the Goolwa lakes.

There's also a Steam Ale, an India Pale Ale and a good old fashioned stout. All are prepared under the watchful eye of brewer, Simon Fennell. The day the Postcards team visited, Simon was checking on a batch of India Pale Ale, made from malt and hops sourced overseas. But they also use plenty of good old fashioned South Aussie products in their brews.

"We use some locally grown Gairdner barley from the Yorke Peninsula," said Simon. "We're covering the world to get the best ingredients to make the best beers."

The idea behind all this had been fermenting in the mind of one of Simon's partners, Gareth Andrews for a long time.

"For many years Gareth was a high school teacher. Now I wouldn't say the kids drove him to drink but throughout his career as a chalkie he was very keen on home brewing and as you can see he's taken his passion to another level."

Like all big ideas, Gareth's started out small with a homemade mini-brewery in his backyard shed. It now takes pride of place at the Steam Exchange.

"It all started when I was a poor uni student," explained Gareth. "There were no home brewing courses at university at the time but the passion was there and it took a few years before I was able to financially ramp this up to what you see today.

"It's a 1-50 scale model of a full working microbrewery," said Gareth proudly. "It produces exactly the same product as a proper microbrewery."

Gareth's a very determined and persuasive bloke. He's even managed to talk his non beer-drinking wife, Angela into serving behind the bar.

"I never imagined the brewing in the backyard shed would ever turn into something like this," she laughed. "It's wonderful to see him fulfil dreams that have been a long time in the making."

The Steam Exchange Brewery is located on the Goolwa Wharf and is open daily from 10am until 6pm.

The Steam Exchange Brewery
Goolwa Wharf
Goolwa
Open daily
10am - 6pm
Ph (08) 8555 3406

Published 18th Feb 2007