OnTap Magazine

It’s a remarkable concept but of course one that brings a whole new problem: what to do with the millet. “There wasn’t really a market for millet, so we decided we would have to make our own market,” says Graham. The team began to brainstorm possible avenues for selling the grain, first looking into packaged foodstuffs like breakfast cereal and snacks. But none of the ideas felt like a winner. One of the partners in the millet venture, elephant conservationist Loki Osborn, had a Cape Town contact he thought could help. Heine du Toit – now a partner in Okavango Craft Brewery – is a food scientist and brewer, a former member of the now defunct Brewers Co-op in Cape Town. He quickly convinced the others that the best use for their millet would be to malt it and turn it into beer. Research kicked off in 2016 and plans for a brewery that would use northern Botswana’s elephant-friendly millet quickly began to take shape. I heard the story of the brewery’s beginnings over sundowner beers as we staked out one of the elephant corridors, hoping to get a glimpse of passing pachyderms. But despite the fact that elephants are abundant in this corner of the country, the only ones we spotted were on the labels of the Delta Lager we sipped as the sun set. Later that day, as the last of the keg was drained, we heard the unmistakable trumpeting of elephants nearby, providing a perfect end to this leg of the trip. It was time to get back to Maun to visit the brewery; perhaps the only brewery in the world whose existence was kicked off by a herd of African elephants. FROM MILLET TO MICROBREWING MEET THE BREWERS After a hot and dusty drive, I arrived in Maun ready for a pint, but first I wanted to meet the team and see the brewery. Okavango’s head brewer is a familiar face. Hailing from Cape Town, Murray Stephenson kicked off his brewing career as an assistant brewer at stock Brewery and later moved to Jack Black for a stint before taking up the head brewer position at Patiala Brewery. But somehow, he seemed destined for the position at Okavango. “I first visited Botswana when I was 10 years old on a family safari trip and I was really taken with it,” he says. “Ever since then I wanted to return and always had an idea about living here for a while. In fact, that whole trip was the reason I went on to study zoology at university. When I was offered the job at Okavango, with the link that the place has to conservation, well, it all just made sense.” Murray has a tight-knit team of brewers working with him including Bongani Josiah, Olerato Ratama and One Kgosibodiba, who joined the team as lead brewer during the pandemic. A trained chef from Gaborone, One saw the position advertised on Facebook and after an interview over Zoom, she moved to Botswana’s Dusty Donkey Town. “I jumped on a bus and moved to Maun knowing nobody here,” she says, clearly without regret. Freshly malted millet Malted millet waiting to be turned into beer Head brewer Murray Stephenson experimental brews North Botswana roads at sunset Germinating millet ready to use in the traditional beer of the region 24 | Autumn 2023 | ontapmag.co.za