Ten years ago, in the infancy of my craft beer journey, Jamieson was one of the reknowned names in the Victorian scene. The bitterness wars were about to begin & Jamieson’s Beast was probably the leading American IPA in the country. Then things changed…
Jeff Whyte, who would later go on to start Social Bandit in nearby Mansfield, sold the business he’d founded in 2001 to Terri Marsden in 2011. Terri came from the banking sector, with no significant hospitality experience. The inevitable happened; the business, & upsettingly the beers, went downhill & was up for sale again less than 2 years later. Wrong Side Brewing entered the frame a couple of years later, rubbed some people the wrong way & left town to become gypsy brewers.
In stepped local sparky James Nelson, a man who had been in Jamieson to witness the rise & subsequent fall of the Jamieson Brewery name. He wanted to bring pride back to a name that was once one of the toasts of the local industry. He’s joined on the team by his wife Shelley, herself a trained chef, who has worked in restaurants around the region after traing at The Marriot in Melbourne, & business partner Tim Arandt, who owns a number of high end fashion labels in Melbourne.
Brewery Type
Physical
Region
High Country
Tasting Room
5953 Eildon-Jamieson Rd, Jamieson
The trio struck a deal with Wrong Side Brewing owner Paul & took possession of the brewery site in April, 2019. First port of call was to install a new kitchen, so Shelley could show off her talents. The pub also had a bit of a facelift, whilst the original Jamieson 12 Hectolitre brewhouse (also part of the deal) had seen better days with a few bits & pieces of key equipment missing or damaged.
One of the key pieces of the puzzle was securing Darren Kerr as their brewmaster. Darren was there at the start of the Jamieson journey alonside Jeff Whyte almost 20 years. He’d been involved with each venture to occupy the site since, in various guises, & was keen to rejoin after falling out with the Wrong Side crew before they ceased operating on the site.
They opened their Brew Pub at the end of June, 2019. Locals & tourists a like flocked, quickly they were doing 450 meals a day & things were looking very positive for the reimaging of the Jamieson brand. 6 months after opening the catastrophic bushfires that hit Victoria removed all tourists from the area & limited movement of locals – the business almost ground to a halt, barely notching 10 meals some days. After a small time closed they re-opened on Australia Day, 2020 & served 760 meals! That’s a lot of work for Shelley & her crew pumping out a wide array of offerings from pub classics to meals that wouldn’t look out of place in a high end restaurant, with a seasonal rotating menu for added difficulty!
And then, like most of the world, COVID-19 hit & shut everything down… It may have been the most dramatic 18 months in Australia history to takeover a brewery! The Jamieson team have slowly been seeing their beers roll out around Melbourne, with the help of Joel Drysdale (Venom). Sales have been slow in Melbourne, in part due to the pandemic & in part due to their choice of packaging. Bottle sales have drastically reduced in Melbourne in recent years with cans the vessel of choice. They hope to solve this in the coming months, with East Coast Canning booked to do a run (of 440ml cans!) in the not to distant future.
They’ve tried to keep some essence of the original brewery, with the majority of the brick country pub the same. There’s still a window through to the brewery, there’s still a country feel to the pub even if it’s been modernized a bit & they’ve brought back some of the Jamieson classics including the Raspberry Ale and, very recently, the beer that put the original on the map The Beast IPA! The brewery location is still superb, with the back deck opening up onto a large grassy area leading down to the Goulburn River.
The Beast hadn’t been re-launched when I visited on the Monday before Cup Day last year. Thankfully Raspberry Ale was & it was tasting great! It had plenty of good fresh raspberry character, with the sweetness nicely balanced by the natural acidity of the fruit. Other highlights from the day were the Brown Ale & the Irish Red Ale. I would keep my eye on these guys
Remember it’s always Beer O’Clock somewhere in the world!
