An Adelaide Hills brewery spent eight years rethinking beer, now its new draught is hitting taps

Malt Donkey was never meant to become what it is today. What started as one man's post-retirement backyard project has evolved into an Australian-first malt house and brewery challenging the way we think about beer. At the centre of it is founder Peter Michell, who spent years trying to solve one fairly simple problem. Peter felt many beers relied too heavily on hops for flavour, while the barley used to make them was largely treated as a generic ingredient, so he wanted to see whether better barley could make a better, more interesting drink. Rather than simply changing his beer recipe, he started growing and malting barley himself. Teaming up with his friend and a fellow home brewer, Gus, who brought the scientific expertise to the project, they began exploring whether barley could express the characteristics of where it was grown. 'Once I started doing that, I got genuinely curious about terroir and its effects, and if barley had it just like wine grapes do,' Peter said. It's a concept most wine drinkers already understand. Grapes grown in different regions, soils and seasons can produce noticeably different wines. The question was if barley could do the same, and this began what would eventually be eight years of research and development. As the project grew, so did the team behind it. Today, Malt Donkey works with brewer Tom Whitehouse and South Australian grain growers to explore how different barley varieties, soils, locations and growing seasons influence the finished ale. The approach is much like that of a winemaker, with the team selecting grain based on where it is grown and the characteristics it can bring to the final product. But before there was Malt Donkey, Peter's friends were the judges. 'I was initially brewing for my own palate without trying to hit a specific style, but I started constructing the Fine Ale based around what my friends liked and didn't like,' he said. Their feedback helped shape the early Fine Ale concept, with Peter adjusting what he was making based on what they liked and didn't like. Over time, the people who had always claimed they didn't like beer started enjoying his creations. Those early experiments became the foundation for a much larger team effort, as Malt Donkey continued testing how barley could contribute flavour in its own right. The result became Fine Ale, Malt Donkey's premium range of single-origin ales designed to put malt, rather than hops, at the centre. Each release uses barley selected for its variety and provenance, allowing different growing regions to produce their own characteristics in the finished ale. Rather than trying to create another craft beer, Malt Donkey is something that could sit comfortably alongside wine. With nobody in the market offering what he created, Malt Donkey was born into its own, and with the Fine Ale established the team has turned its attention to something designed to be enjoyed a little more often. Enter Really Good Draught. The new 4.5 percent draught beer takes the same malt-first thinking behind Fine Ale and puts it into a more familiar tap format for pubs, restaurants and wine bars. And according to Peter, it came about almost by accident. 'We are very much Fine Ale makers, but we just wanted to see how our beautiful malt would perform at lower alcohol levels,' he said. 'We ended up with something incredibly tasty and easy to drink. 'We realised there was a gap for a well-crafted drink made from exceptional malt that leans entirely away from bitterness and over-hoppiness.' Rather than trying to recreate a traditional draught beer, Malt Donkey has approached it from the opposite direction. For the team, Really Good Draught is effectively the younger sibling of Fine Ale. It gives people an easy introduction to the Malt Donkey philosophy over a pint before moving into its more complex, bottle-aged Fine Ale releases. It also begins to fill out the bigger vision for Malt Donkey: a range stretching from an approachable premium draught through to collectible Fine Ales made to be shared around a table, paired with food and explored much like wine. For venues, it offers something different at the premium end of the tap list. For drinkers, particularly those who find heavily hopped beer too bitter, it offers another way into the category altogether. And underneath both products remains the idea that started in Peter's backyard all those years ago: that barley shouldn't simply be treated as the ingredient sitting behind the beer. Where it was grown, how it was grown and what variety was planted can matter too. After eight years spent proving that point, Malt Donkey is quietly convincing us to pay attention to what is actually in out glass. To find out more about Malt Donkey, and where to buy the Fine Ale and Really Good Draught, click here.