The best breweries in Melbourne

Abbotsford is one of Melbourne’s coolest entertainment areas right now with fun dive bars, great live music venues and plenty of delicious casual eating. At the epicentre stands Bodriggy Brewery, a huge space that sports not only a massive bank of taps pouring limited releases to keep the thirsty satisfied, but also great cocktails and some of the best Latin American food in the city thanks to Mexican chef Johny Dominguez (formerly of Dinner By Heston and Vue du Monde). Regular DJ sets and elevated food and drink offerings give this place a more adult feel than Melbourne’s other family oriented brewery bars, but the kids are still welcome, if they can handle a little spice!

Moon Dog World’s location in the light-industrial hinterlands of Preston may seem an odd choice for an open-to-the-public brewery, but the heaving crowd on a Sunday just goes to show they picked the right spot. Young families of the northside wanting to stay close to home for a bevvy descend on this warehouse-cum-funhouse every weekend en masse to enjoy the cascades of beer pouring forth. Designed like the set of a '90s kids obstacle show, there’s thankfully no slime at the end, but there is an indoor lake with a fountain, a river running through the middle of the cavernous space and a full-sized indoor playground. Open seven days and sporting a room loaded with arcade games, plenty of easy-going food and enough beer to kickstart your dad-bod, Moon Dog World is the parental playground Melbourne needed.  

Bringing the beer-soaked fun to the southeast is Kaiju Cantina, home to one of Melbourne’s most recognizable beers (the Kaiju Krush is the craft tinny of summer, every summer). This warehouse taproom is full of light, thanks to heaps of skylights, and colour, thanks to hand-painted murals of the same poppy artwork found on their cans. Open five days a week, it’s all about fun here with a state-of-the-art pizza oven pumping out cheeseburger pizzas and a 1960s Toyota Coaster bus you can sit inside. 

The newcomer on the list, Molly Rose in Collingwood has just opened a shiny new space on Wellington Parade that includes a beer garden, spacious bar and a private function area presided over by the skylights of the beautiful heritage factory roof. There are always special beers on tap, plus a smaller brewing kit for experimental and collaboration releases. Molly Rose has also just launched an exciting new modern Australian/Southeast Asian menu inspired by the street food of Darwin. Options include kangaroo tartare, drunken fried rice and smashed cucumber salad with whipped tofu, making this easily one of the most interesting brewery menus in Melbourne. Molly Rose also boasts some of the most interesting non-alcoholic beers in town such as a delicious strawberry lime sour that’ll help you forget the hard stuff in a flash. 

As one of Melbourne’s most dynamic hospitality areas right now, Brunswick East would never be left behind on a trend. Alchemy Brewing is this neighbourhood’s answer to the brewery bar, and one of the few in Melbourne that’s open seven days. With a serious list of wines and cocktails alongside the on-site brewed beers, this is a brewery that caters to more than just the hop-heads among us. Food goes well beyond your standard pub fare, too, with options such as fried halloumi with compressed watermelon, rocket pesto and blood orange honey, plus fries dusted with stout and vinegar salt. But be assured that none of this overshadows the fascinating frothies flowing forth from Alchemy’s 16 taps. 

For the raw quality of beer, it’s hard to go past Hop Nation. The independently owned brewery by former winemakers Sam Harbour and Duncan Gibson has been pumping out consistantly good booze that’s hard to match in Melbourne for years now, often leading the charge on major beer trends (the J-Juice, which once sported a tattooed Princess Leia before certain lawyers got narky, was one of the first widely available juicy IPAs in Melbourne). The small-batch beers are made using natural ingredients with no fining or pasteurisation and minimal filtration. The brewery is only open on the weekends, and there are food trucks on rotation to keep you well fed.

Another longstanding entry on this list, this westside stalwart is Australia's first female-owned brewing operation, and still going strong today with its Sunset Ale a welcome fixture on taps around the city. Affectionately known as 'the nest', Two Birds’ big warehouse space pours perennial beers as well as special editions only available on site, and hosts brewery tours twice a day for only $20 on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. It also plays every Western Bulldogs AFLW game live and loud so you can settle in and cheer on the mighty women of footy with a female-made pint in hand. 

Not all breweries stick to the formula of a couple of easy-going lagers and ales to pay the bills. The crew at Future Mountain have taken craft to the extreme, releasing only 750ml bottle-conditioned saisions, farmhouse ales and barrel-aged sours. The Future Mountain taproom overlooks the open fermentation room and Culture Club (aka a lab that contains years of cultivating different strains of yeast), where you can watch the house specialty mixed-cultures bubbling away for a truly immersive farmhouse-inspired brewery experience. There are a dozen taps pouring a forever-changing list of seasonal and limited-edition single-barrel beers, so it’s a great way to try the range before committing to one of those big bottles. Local Victorian wine is also highlighted, but make no mistake, this is one for the true beer geeks.

One of the first breweries to really kick-start the trend in Melbourne, Stomping Ground figured out what people wanted early on: an easy place to chill out with the kids on a weekend, order a pizza or two and try some fun beers. The warehouse space in the back streets of Collingwood is filled with light, greenery, rusted iron girders and paint-peeling timber for a decidedly comfy backyard vibe in any weather, and there’s even a small play space for the kiddies. Grab a tasting board of beers and settle in for the arvo. 

A classic warehouse-style brewpub, Westside is the best side at this stripped-back space with a decidedly American slant – its beers, food and atmosphere are inspired by American ex-pat brewer Casey Wagner’s experience on the US West Coast. Here you’ll find 30 taps stocked with the freshest of the fresh from the tiny brewery such as steam ale, American pale ale, West Coast IPA and oatmeal brown ale. Ten of the taps are also dedicated to beloved craft brews from other producers. There’s even a range of pizzas assembled using hand-stretched dough (made with its own beer) and house-smoked bacon.