The 2 Brothers Brewery award-winning brews are the creation of brothers, Andrew and Dave Ong. Their tale begins after both brothers had made their way to the United States for work. Andrew was in Seattle on the west coast, working as an aeronautical engineer, while Dave was in New York on the east coast, working as a physiotherapist. When visiting his brother, Dave discovered some of the many craft breweries that Andrew had been enjoying. A seed was sown that would eventually sprout.

After returning to Australia, the brothers gave up their careers and set about with plans for their own brewery. Andrew went back to the US to get some hands on brewing tuition at Diamond Knot Brewery, in Seattle. Meanwhile, Dave spent his time in Melbourne looking for an appropriate location for a brewery.

Suitable brewery equipment was eventually located in New York. The Times Square Brewery restaurant had gone out of business and the equipment was to be sold for scrap metal. Quick action by the brothers ensured that it would soon be heading to Australia, instead of going back to Canada. It was now up Dave to get the 1800 litre brewing equipment out of busy Times Square. After some hard work and careful planning, a convoy of flat bed trucks were quickly loaded up in the early hours of a Sunday morning before anyone in the busy city had time to realise what was happening.

Anyone who has their own brewery will tell you about the sense of accomplishment they felt after brewing their first beer in the brewery. So after a couple of years of hard work and planning, Andrew and Dave were delighted when they were able to brew their first beer in their own brewery in November 2007.

The 2 Brothers Brewery is located in Moorabbin’s industrial estate. While the brewery takes up the largest part of the building, there is still plenty of room for a bar and beer hall. The beers are served from taps that draw beer directly from the bright tanks behind the bar. When you go to visit, you’ll notice that, as a reminder of their origins, each tank is named after the New York districts of Soho, Hell’s Kitchen, Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens, and Harlem.

Andrew is now brewing full time at the brewery, with Ben Lee and AJ as assistants. Ben will be familiar to anyone who watched Gage Rossiter’s Beer Frontier on Channel 31, where he appeared as “Ben The Home Brewer.” Dave looks after the sales and business side of the brewery, and Andrew’s wife, Marcia, takes care of beer hall event bookings.

There are four regular beers: Taxi, a German style pilsner; Growler, a US style brown ale; and Kung Foo, a rice lager. The Griz is a popular special brew and may be added to the line up of regular brews. The brothers make a number of seasonal and special brews, which means regular visits to the brewery are well worthwhile. Among the favourites are the award winning Guv’nor barley wine and the Voodoo Baltic porter. Gypsy is a pear and apple semisweet cider that is also very popular.

Take away beer and cider is sold at the bar in 4 packs or slabs. They also have 2 litre growlers available, which means that you can take home a growler of Growler. Additionally, 30 and 50 litre kegs and dispensing systems are available for hire.

Any brewery will tell you that getting kegs back from pubs can be a problem, especially from interstate. So interstate pubs are now receiving their 2 Brothers beer in recyclable metal kegs. The kegs are from Schäfer Werke, and are bought by the container load and shipped in from Germany.

You can now get Pizzas cooked to order in their new pizza oven. There is a good atmosphere in the evenings, when they have live musicians playing. Visit the brewery to try one of their special brews or even just to have some of the regular beers and a pizza. Brewery open hours are Thursdays 4 to 10pm, and Fridays 12pm to midnight. Free tours are conducted on Thursdays at 6pm.

The brewery is located at 4 Joyner Street, Moorabbin, VIC, 3189.
For more details go to the website or call 03 9553 1177.