OnTap Magazine

ontapmag.co.za | Winter 2025 | 49 wasn't great, but I was convinced it was good as I fermented something, and I made something that was alcoholic which I thought was quite rad. BL: Did you enjoy drinking the first beer you ever brewed? CN: Yes, I really did. I ended up doing another kit from them and then started going on Reddit and checking the homebrew and all-grain brewing sections to get more information on it. I then got a homebrew setup from Brendan Hart with a three- tier system and got into all-grain brewing. BL: Were there any places that you frequented to get to know about other beer styles to consider brewing? CN: Definitely Gilroy's! I used to go there often and just enjoy their vibes and of course their more traditional English-styled beers. Steve Gilroy made my time there awesome while trying their unique beers and getting into this world of beer. Steve made this new beer adventure an enjoyable experience. Gilroy's was also the place I ended up doing my first all-grain brew with Vincent Le Roux, who took me through the processes of how to brew on this system I bought from Brendan. BL: The name 400 Brewing Company, where did it come from? CN: It was a result of me using a 400L brewing system to brew my first proper beer. An engineer mate of mine Braam looked at my homebrew set-up and said, "Let's beef this up a bit!" and we ended up creating a 400L brewhouse. The name 400 came naturally afterwards. BL: What made you look into Harambe the gorilla? CN: Well, when Harambe came into play, I had already moved from Joburg and left my brewery behind. I was working at Drifter Brewing Company, and I knew I wanted to do a big double IPA. Another brewer and I at Drifter, Jean, decided to look into this beer and we found these memes online about Harambe. A couple guys at the ad agency, affiliated with Drifter, had already started playing with the Harambe idea and had made some label designs. The artwork actually came first before the beer did. The artwork for the initial Harambe and the Harambe 2 Resurrection had come directly from those guys. BL: So, the initial idea was a double IPA for Harambe? CN: That's correct. But that other brewer I mentioned, Jean, said to me: "Isn't Harambe a black gorilla?" I was like obviously! So, at the last moment I added some dark malts to my malt bill, and all of a sudden, we had a black IPA and Harambe was born. BL: Did you know how iconic Harambe would become? CN: I think we rode that viral wave on the first one, and when the second one came out, we realised that a lot of people were getting quite excited about it, so we decided to kind of go all the way and bring it out annually but change it up a bit with every release. BL: The collaboration side of things with Harambe being brewed out of different breweries, was that due to leaving the brewery in Joburg? CN: Yes and no. After leaving my brewery back in Joburg, Nick from Drifter was extremely helpful and allowed me to get my first five editions of the beer done for a very good price at Drifter. Then when their business model changed, Harambe became a beer that I would be brewing at different breweries. BL: After the 5th Harambe was done, what other breweries did you look into? CN: Well, the 6th edition, "Harambe's Baby," was done with PG Groenewald at Mountain Brewing Company and due to it being the 6th edition, I decided that a 660ml selling at R66.60 with an ABV of 6.6% all worked together well. I used the original poster for “Rosemary's Baby” to recreate my “Harambe's Baby” label. Then all the editions after that have been done with Afro Caribbean Brewing Co. Jake at ACBC has been an awesome help and just an all-round great guy to work with. BL: So, I know you don't brew full time anymore and in fact recently opened your own bar? CN: Yes! I opened a beer bar that caters to the locals that live in Observatory, but it's more like a beer and music bar for everyone. The nice thing is that it isn't a brewery, so the overhead is a lot less, and I get to hang out with craft beer people and have some awesome interesting conversations. I realised that I can't just have a bar that sells beer, and it needs to have its own thing going on, so I try get some rad musicians in so everyone there can have a good time. BL: Awesome! Thanks for your time Carl! One last question: will we see more Harambe in the future? CN: We most definitely will! The artwork I feel will always have unique aspects to them, and there could also be a rerelease on the cards that I would like to do. But we’ll just have to wait and see…