Lucy Corner. Picture: SUPPLIED
Lucy Corner. Picture: SUPPLIED

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IT WAS Death by Hops that did it. Lucy Corne was overcome. "Why have I been drinking anything else?" she thought.

That beer, brewed in South Korea by a member of the brewer’s club of which Corne and husband, Shawn Duthie, were members, called forth a career. Corne now lives with Duthie in Cape Town, and not only drinks beer, but makes money writing about it. She has just produced her second book on the subject, Beer Safari: A Journey through the Breweries of SA.

"I did drink beer at university, mostly lager," says Corne, who grew up in beer-crazy England, "but it took a Canadian from Thunder Bay to get me drinking ales. He’s such a beer fanatic. It made me realise there’s a lot more to it."

There is also a lot more of it in South Africa, variety-wise, these days. The explosion of the craft beer market — here and abroad — started in about 2010.

"The first Cape Town beer festival was in 2010, with about 10 beers. Now there are 150+," she says. It is, of course, hard to count the number of independent breweries in South Africa, even the licensed ones, but no one who has been alert in the past few years would deny the explosion.

Corne’s book lists more than 90 breweries in eight provinces.

"I am just waiting for a brewery in the Northern Cape. I have heard there are some in Orania, but we won’t go there."

Details

Beer Safari
  • TITLE: Beer Safari: A Journey through the Breweries of SA
  • AUTHOR: Lucy Corne
  • PUBLISHER:Struik Lifestyle

Beer Safari is arranged so that the reader can use the book to plot routes that take them from microbrewery to microbrewery across those eight provinces.

For many beer lovers in South Africa the hardest thing to swallow, recently, has been Anheuser-Busch InBev’s $122bn takeover of SABMiller, the multinational beer company second only in size to the Belgian-Brazilian AB InBev. That takeover — agreed to in principle, with a November 11 deadline to agree a formal takeover deal — has consequences for South Africa’s independent breweries.

For one, SABMiller’s South African arm, South African Breweries (SAB), owns all the intellectual property on South African-bred hops plants, says Corne. There are also concerns over AB InBev’s potential control of distribution networks. Earlier this year the Competition Commission lost its decade-long distribution case against SAB in the Competition Appeal Court.

The commission was appealing against the Competition Tribunal’s decision last year not to abolish SAB’s exclusive territorial agreements with its 13 appointed distributors. While 90% of SAB’s distribution is done through its own depots, the remaining 10% is done through appointed distributors across the country. This portion has been under the spotlight since a complaint was made by an independent liquor distributor in 2004.

Distribution is one of the challenges South Africa’s independent brewers face, says Corne. She does not, however, think it is the worst. What really has brewers frothing at the mouth is the slow pace of getting a brewing licence. "It’s become a full-time job," she says.

"You can’t apply without premises," she says, "But then it can take months (to get a licence) … I have heard some stories of really wonderful landlords who have allowed brewers to operate rent-free until they get their licence."

This kind of camaraderie is one of the characteristics that has drawn Corne to South Africa’s growing independent brewing community. "I like the beer culture. It’s different, laid-back, open and welcoming, fun, but it’s also become more pretentious."

Not that Corne minds the increasing discussion of beer’s various qualities, or the sometimes florid descriptions. "It’s true, the best beer I ever had was after a 7km hike, but why not have something with lots of flavour? There are so many ways you can get those flavours into beers. Usually it’s via the hops, but then there are also the malts. Yes, there are some people doing strange things. I believe in Iceland someone used whale testicles to flavour their beer and in the States a guy used yeast cultivated from his beard. It’s fine, by the way. I tasted it, but it’s a revolting idea."

It’s true. Oregon’s Rogue Ales brewed what is described as an "American wild ale" using wild yeast originally cultured from nine beard hairs belonging to Rogue Ales’ brewmaster, John Maier. As unappetising as that idea is, Maier did not get as much bad press as Icelandic micro-brewery Stedji, which really did use smoked whales’ testicles to flavour a limited-edition brew to mark the Icelandic midwinter month of Thorri.

Stedji’s use of the testicles of endangered fin whales caused outrage in some circles. Brewer Dagbjartur Arilíusson told Draftmag.com, the backlash "actually brings more attention to the beer, which is a positive thing. Most of the protests come from people outside of Iceland. People have to remember that the fin whale is not endangered in the North Atlantic, and Iceland is known for sustainable fishing and setting quotas for our whale hunt. There’s actually a lot of demand for our beer to be exported, but there are laws that limit which countries can import it because of antiwhaling laws. The beer will sell out in Iceland, and people from other countries want a taste."

Corne cannot say whether that beer is any good, but she does not agree with the claim that there is no such thing as a bad beer. "I’ve been told, ‘Oh, no, it’s craft beer. It’s meant to taste funny’ when I have sent beers back, but that’s not true."

Corne’s first book, African Brew, written with Ryno Reyneke, won Best Beer Book in SA in the 2013 Gourmand World Cookbook Awards. It was how readers used it that gave her the idea for Beer Safari — they often took it with them when they visited independent breweries.

Beer Safari is set out so that readers can plot routes that will take them to independent breweries across SA. Each chapter begins with a map with an extensive legend, the pages after that contain brief, informative description of each brewery featured — whether it is open to the public, what it offers and, of course, tasting notes. There’s also a "coming soon" section that lists breweries that were not yet up and running, or licensed, when Beer Safari went to print.

Corne, who runs brewing courses in between writing on beer (she has a blog, The Brewmistress), is planning on running food and beer pairing courses next year, and some travel.

"Next? Who knows? I would love to travel to the States. My dream beer safari would be along the West Coast of the US. Bliss for the beer geek."