Moon Dog World in Preston is a brewhouse like no other
With its lagoon, deckchairs, rainforest greenery and a retractable sun roof, this is a Melbourne brewery like no other. Oh yeah, there’s beer too.
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Another day, another urban brewery.
But, as with everything brothers Josh and Jake Uljans and Karl Van Buuren of Abbotsford’s Moon Dog have done so far, their new brewery is different. Very, very different.
In the industrial backstreets of deepest Preston you’ll find Moon Dog World, 12,000sq m of hop-fuelled fun times that includes a centrepiece indoor lagoon surrounded by deck chairs under a fully retractable roof.
And on this sunny Saturday arvo, it seems every man and his (moon) dog is here, with the huge space filled with young families where there are beers for mum and dad, mini corn dogs for the kids and good times on tap for all.
There’s a huge central bar, a forest of greenery, a secret barrel ageing room and a hidden tropical disco zone for dancing after dark. It’s wacky, wild and pretty wonderful.
This mammoth project cements the next stage of the Moon Dog journey that began nine years ago with the trio’s first brews. Their Abbostford brewery produced two million litres of beer last year but their new Preston home will have capacity to brew five times that.
Poured from more than 70 taps, those beers include a bright and summery tropical lager, a zippy, zany pine lime ice cream IPA and a boysenberry sour ale among eight core brews served by pot, schooner and jug.
They join myriad one-off and experimental brews that are as inventively named — How Now Brown Cacao, Bad Boy Bubbly — as they are deliciously creative. Rum and raisin imperial stout, anyone?
Aperol spritz and espresso martinis join carafes of wine on tap from super cool McLaren Vale winery Alpha Box and Dice, while the short wine list is a clever collection of accessible and interesting next-gen independents who are marching to the beat of their own stomped grapes.
Industry heavyweights including Matt Kenna (ex Little Creatures in Fremantle) and Chris Hysted-Adams (ex Black Pearl) lead the young, helpful and friendly team.
Offering table service, staff do a heroic number of steps ferrying those beers and food that flies fast from the kitchen.
Damon Philippakos (ex North Fitzroy’s Terminus Hotel) is looking after the food, his peripatetic menu offering something for everyone, from pork bao bites ($10 for two) through rotisserie chooks ($16/$28), silken tofu ($15) through swordfish skewers ($29).
Japanese karaage is food tailor made for beer and the squid tentacles ($15) here are terrific — lightly battered in rice flour and fried deep tan, they come with a pond of kewpie mayo for dunking the crunchy fried critters in.
Served on a stick, those mini corn dogs ($9) are fine fairground fun though the chipotle ketchup squiggled atop lacked any real smokiness. A tasty, sticky soy Sichuan sauce works well with eggplant ($23) that needed, however, longer in the fryer for the doughy batter to properly become crisp as advertised.
Ditto the floury, wan crinkle-cut chips served alongside a fine-if-forgettable chicken burger ($22).
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For a brewery with a fearless flavour-first philosophy, the food tried was surprisingly shy, needing more power, more personality to properly shine.
But dialled up a notch or three and the food will match the beers that already have northsiders over the moon at this new brew lagoon.
MOON DOG WORLD
32-46 Chifley Dr, Preston
Open: Daily from 11am
Phone: 9428 2307
Go-to dish: Squid tentacle karaage