The Inner West suburb, Marrickville, is one of the best places to taste the best craft beers that Sydney has to offer. For those planning a Marrickville Brewery Tour, or even a wider Inner West Brewery Tour, we're sharing our 6 favourite Sydney craft breweries that you can't miss out on!
This Marrickville brewery tour ranges from once in a lifetime flavours at Wildflower Brewing & Blending to gorgeous seating areas at Willie The Boatman. Let's dig into the ultimate brewery pub crawl!
The Legendary Marrickville Brewery Tour
Willie The Boatman
The first stop on your Marrickville brewery tour is the gorgeous Willie The Boatman. Named after the legend of a convict boatman, self-proclaimed 'fat dads', Pat McInerney and Nick Newey, launched the brewery in 2012. Over the years, the craft brewery has become much loved by beer-loving Sydneysiders while remaining slightly unknown to the bigger crowd.
We recommend starting your craft beer pub crawl here as your head will still be clear enough to listen to the behind-the-scenes brewery tour. During this tour, you will learn how craft beer is made and why their craft beer is so special compared to your average larger.
If you're taking it easy and starting with only one beer, we go absolutely ballistic over Crazy Ivan IPA. The name perfectly embodies the flavour of this bold little firecracker and we highly recommend it.
Willie The Boatman brewery is on the edge of St Peters and Marrickville and is only open on Thursdays through Sundays.
Batch Brewing Co.
Next up on our the Marrickville Brewery tour, we head over to Batch Brewing Co! Plan this one in early as well as this craft brewery gets packed -with a capital P - later in the afternoon.
Batch Brewing make their beers the old-fashioned way; batch per batch. Changing the offer every two weeks, you will continuously be entertained with new batches of craft beer. Even if you live around the corner. Batch Brewing Co. brews its beers for its neighbourhood and is therefore open most days, Tuesdays to Sundays.
Similar to Willie The Boatman, you can ask for a private brewery tour where they share the "science and art behind each Batch". We highly recommend trying one of their beer tasting paddles with no less than 6 of their craft beers. Not crazy about tasting paddles? Try the India Pale Ale or the current equivalent instead!
Stockade Brew Co.
Cocktail lovers rejoice as Stockade Brew Co. is a place for both beer-lovers and their non-beer-loving friends. Serving limited-run beers is where Stockade Brew Co truly shines. Often serving craft beers that are exclusive to their tasting bar. If you get peckish, locally famous food truck Baby Rey's Burgers is parked outside and has got you covered!
Sauce Brewing Co.
We love Sauce Brewing Co. and include it in most of our inner west brewery tours as it has Sydney's best beer garden. Particularly if you are traveling with a bigger group, Sauce is a great stop during your Marrickville brewery tour!
With 12 taps of the best craft beers "this side of Pluto", you can easily spend all afternoon here. Sauce Brewing Co is open Thursdays to Sundays with an on-site food truck every Friday-Saturday-Sunday. Thursday evenings you can head straight here from work as they serve pizzas for their mid-week clientele.
Wildflower Brewery
The fifth stop on the Marrickville brewery tour is the Wildflower Brewery. The name is, as you can probably guess, inspired by the natural landscape of NSW. Not surprising at all if you know that the founders of the brewery look for natural sources of yeast and bacteria in said landscape.
Using natural yeasts is known in the industry as 'mixed fermentation' and it allows the brewery to create one of a kind Belgian-style sour ales. Another much-loved technique in Wildflower Brewery is blending old and new barrel-aged beers. This allows them to emphasize the complexity of their wild yeast flavours even more.
Head to their blog if you want to read more in-depth information about the thought process behind each and every beer created by this inner west brewery. Plan your brewery pub crawl on a Friday or Saturday if you don't want to miss out on Wildflower Brewery as they are closed every other day of the week.
The Grifter Brewing Co.
The Grifter Brewery was started by mates Matt, Glenn & Trent in 2012. Already making craft beer in their homes, they wanted to bring their version of a coldie to beer-loving Sydney. Edward, their friendly-named pale ale, became their first commercially brewed beer. Back then, it was only served in the newly opened Young Henry's. In 2015, many awards later, Edward was finally being served in its first proper home, The Grifter Brewery.
Keeping Edward, their pale ale, as the only permanent beer, they continuously try out new styles of beer. Our favourite, hands down, is the Grifter Pale Ale. It is one of those craft beers that gets better with every mouthful.
Grifters Brewery makes you feel like home and even allows you to bring your kiddo and your pooch. While Sydney restaurants are not very pet-friendly, most Inner West breweries happily welcome you and your furry friends!
Marrickville Brewery Itinerary
That's it guys, you now know everything you need to know to plan in an epic Marrickville Brewery Tour! We recommend following the craft breweries as we mention above. First stop at Willie The Boatman, followed by Batch Brewing Co., Stockade Brew Co., Sauce Brewing Co., Wildflower Brewery and finishing at The Grifter Brewing Co.
But wait, we can't let you go yet. Not without a special little bonus. A craft brewery that we could not leave out of this article, Young Henrys. Let me tell you why.
Bonus Brewery: Young Henrys
While we have to wander out of Marrickville and into Newtown to get to Young Henrys, we could not complete this article without mentioning our all-time favourite craft brewery.
Only a 15-min walk from the last craft brewery on your Marrickville brewery tour, Young Henrys is Urban Legends Tour Co.'s local brewery. Consequently, it is also home to our most beloved local beer, The Newtowner. As Urban Legends Tour Company was born in the heart of Newtown, our earliest meetings were always accompanied by a Newtowner. Consequently, it comes as no surprise that this brewery will always have a special place in our hearts.
Whether you plan you plan your own craft beer pub crawl or you come along on one of our own Inner West Brewery Tours, don't miss out on Young Henrys or any of the craft breweries mentioned in this article for that matter.
Happy bar hopping legends!
