Cheers from the Philippines

[kalbo777]

Hi all,

Expat here, living in the Philippines for best part of 10 years now. The craft beer scene here is finally taking off and I'm hoping to be part of it soon, I've done my share of drinking what's on offer now hopefully I can make a few good brews of my own. Hoping to replicate some good pale ales that I used to drink in Aus.

Cheers!

 

[Bribie G]

Welcome to the forum. Surprised to see so many craft breweries now, even in outlying areas like Palawan. Is there any scope for home brewing there?

 

[Moad]

Hi Kalbo,

I have a friend that lives in Antipolo City, do you know of any homebrew shops close by or in Manila where he can pick up kits and bits? I ordered a coopers kit for him only to find it was shipped from Oz and is now held up in customs!

Cheers

 

[kalbo777]

Welcome to the forum. Surprised to see so many craft breweries now, even in outlying areas like Palawan. Is there any scope for home brewing there?

Hi thanks, what you're finding is a lot of people who have been overseas are coming back and opening restaurants and to a smaller extend dabbling in the craft beer scene, there seems to be a growing middle class and there is a demand for better quality products whether that is food or beer. In the past two years alone, dozens upon dozens of good eateries have opened up just in our area.

Just about every town or city in the Philippines has a few expats so between them and the Filipinos that have worked overseas and returned are pushing the demand for better products and thankfully that includes better beer. The Palawan craft brewery is actually run by two women and doing a great job by all accounts.

Hi Kalbo,

I have a friend that lives in Antipolo City, do you know of any homebrew shops close by or in Manila where he can pick up kits and bits? I ordered a coopers kit for him only to find it was shipped from Oz and is now held up in customs!

Cheers

Hi Moad, one of the craft brewers in Manila (Juan Brew) offer home brew equipment, hops, malts etc, not sure about home brew kits though and I did see on the net a couple of weeks ago a site offering kits, I think some of them included Coopers products, I'll try and find the name. There are a lot of tap rooms/bars in Manila now offering lots of choices of Philippine and overseas brews, there is also a chain called The Bottle Shop, not owned by an Aussie by the way! The guy is a guru, stock hundreds of different beers from all over the world.

Crazy Carabao is owned by an Aussie, think they are on the south side of Manila, getting closer to Laguna way, they are quite established now and their beer is good!

If anyone wants more info on what's going on I will do my best to let you know.

Cheers.

 

[Moad]

Thanks for that, I came across that website but the kits are ridiculously expensive.

1200 pesos ($30 aud) for 1 gallon!

I purchased the kit from here - http://homebrew.com.ph/shop/

Looks like they just ship from Australia but the prices are much better than other stores in Asia.

 

[kalbo777]

Yeah they are expensive. I don't mind drinking their beer though, another good brewery.

The link you put up is the same as the one I looked at, they should be stocking small amounts and not ordering from overseas when someone puts in an order, that happens here quite a bit, well maybe for more exotic things like home brewing kits etc.

I talked to a local brewer here and he said he gets some ingredients from MGM in Manila, they also have an offshoot company that's associated with Holgate, might be worth checking although I doubt they do kits.

 

[SskkyyHL]

Oi! Cheers mate.

Philippines is an interesting place!