How scientist turned brewer Carla Daunton is raising the bar for women

A drunken night out gave an Aussie scientist her first break in an unexpected career – now she’s helping clear the path for other women.

Carla Daunton, Young Henrys Head Distiller.

Carla Daunton is a little sheepish about how she first became involved in the craft beer business.

“It’s embarrassing but I have told this story so many times that I have no dignity,” she says with a laugh.

The way she tells it, she was fed up with her career as a biochemist and nanoengineer when a colleague and friend dragged her along to Juniperlooza – a celebration of all things gin-related – to lift her spirits.

As a whiskey and beer drinker, she went along with no great expectations but discovered that “after sampling all the stands, I liked gin very much”.

“Some liquid courage got me going and I asked one of the distillers after buying one of his gins how he got into the industry,” she says.

“I was literally like ‘I want to do what you do – you guys look like you are fun’.”

After hearing about her science background, the distiller realised she had exactly the skills that were required in the booze biz and after a stint at a production ethanol distillery in the Hunter Valley, honing her scientific skills and learning plant management, decided she wanted to try her hand at craft beer.

“I was like ‘screw this, I want to learn beer’,” she says.

“In my mind I had this lofty goal of being a brewer/distiller in my 50s or 60s – something to aim for.

“I applied for Young Henrys as a brewer because before I got too far down the distilling path I wanted to learn about craft brewing. So I had the interview and they put me on as a brewer and within a year I was a brewer/distiller – and then head distiller.”

Carla Daunton, Young Henrys Head Distiller, has built up a network of women brewers.

The point of Daunton’s tale is that had she not had that slightly drunken encounter, she may never have found her dream career.

While her skills in science and teaching were ultimately useful, she says that “no one came to my science classroom at high school or in university and said ‘you could be brewer or a distiller’”.

Though she wasn’t the first female brewer at Young Henrys, in Sydney’s inner west, women in craft beer are still the exception rather than the rule and Daunton still laments the talent that has already been lost to the industry from women who never even knew it was a career option.

“It’s interesting to see that it is changing,” she says.

“It’s obviously still slow and there is a lot we can continue to improve on in terms of visibility of female brewers and distillers in the industry, and accessing those young women.”

For that reason alone, she’s proud to be involved in the Young Henry’s Brewing Scholarship, which funds tuition for a female identifying/non-binary brewer.

The program, now in its second year and worth more than $10,000, has partnered with TAFE NSW to fund tuition for the Certificate III Food Processing (Micro Brewing) as well as providing mentorship from Young Henrys’ female brains trust including Daunton, Zoe Catterall from the Young Henrys Lab, and Mariel Santiago from the Young Henrys brew house.

Daunton says that last year’s winner, Laura Nosworthy, is “an absolute gun”, who has already built a name for herself in the tight-knit inner-west Sydney craft brewing community.

“She already has this amazing rep as someone who can do it all, is keen as mustard, wants to learn, wants to get stuck in and she has a really bright future ahead of her,” says Daunton.

Carla Daunton says she still has to deal with “mansplaining” at work.

Daunton says that despite still being the minority, she has developed a network of women in her brewing community, who she now considers friends, supporters, colleagues and collaborators.

She says that of all the male-dominated industries she has worked in, brewing and distilling is the most welcoming. Mind you, there are still some cultural challenges to overcome.

“You still have some people coming up on the brewery deck during a brewery tour and trying to mansplain your job to you,” she says, rolling her eyes.

“I have had some hilariously shocking encounters and if we can get to a point it’s just expected that a female brewer beside 6000 litres of boiling wort actually knows what she’s talking about and not have a homebrewer explain it to her, that would be great. That’s progress.”

While the increasing number of female beer drinkers – and the fact that brewers have realised the potential of an untapped market – has undoubtedly raised the profile of women in the industry, Daunton rejects the notion that they gravitate to any particular style.

“If you sit a bunch of female brewers around a table, we all like something different,” she says.

“Just like men have all the tastebuds, we have them too and we have our own preferences.”

And her advice for women who would like to get involved in brewing or distilling?

“I would say take advantages of opportunities like these to apply for this scholarship,” she says.

“Not just that, seek out women that you notice in the industry – we are around, we are available, so reach out. I am now the one at the beer fests and the gin fests, so come up and talk to me and my colleagues. Cry at me – drunk or not. It’s come full circle.”

Apply at younghenrys.com/brewing-scholarship

HEAR ME POUR

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Originally published as How scientist turned brewer Carla Daunton is raising the bar for women