11 Beers Made with Breakfast Foods Like Bacon, Oats, and Coffee
On January 11, sometime around sunrise, thousands of beer-drinking Floridians began flocking to Funky Buddha Brewery, located outside of Fort Lauderdale. Who wanted brews before eating pancakes or eggs?
As the sun rose, the line and anticipation swelled. At 11 a.m., Funky Buddha employees gave the all clear and the line inched forward. Attendees exchanged $15 in cash for a wristband that allowed them to grab a bottle of Maple Bacon Coffee Porter, one of the most lusted-after porters in America. Over the day, around 4,000 attendees snapped up the allotted 3,000 bottles, demand far outstripping supply.
“The beer tastes like breakfast at a roadside dinner,” says Funky Buddha’s brand director, John Linn. “We want to create beers that you can sip and taste a dish or evoke a memory. And breakfast has many memorable flavors.”
Welcome to the eye-opening world of breakfast beer. Breweries countrywide have begun turning to the day’s first meal for inspiration, tossing oats, coffee, maple syrup, milk sugar, tea, and even Dutch appelstroop into the brew kettle, devising brews fit for at the breakfast table. Rhode Island’s state beverage, coffee milk, is re-created in Narragansett’s Autocrat Coffee Milk Stout. Coffee also stars in Founders’ fittingly named Breakfast Stout, while tea lovers will welcome Rogness’s chai-inspired Yogi. Crave a bacon-topped doughnut? Try Rogue’s Bacon Maple Ale. If you’d rather have a breakfast-focused beer with healthier aims, look toward Martin House’s Day Break.
The head brewer of Martin House was toying around with lactose (or milk sugar), different malts, and honey, realizing that the beer mimicked a bowl of cereal. “We’ve had comparisons to Honey Nut Cheerios,” says David Wedemeier, co-founder of the Fort Worth, Texas–based brewery, adding that the beer is his best-selling brand. “People usually laugh when we describe the beer, but then they usually ask for seconds.”
Perhaps this signals the dawn of a new era of American beer drinking, one in which mimosas and bloodies are joined by beer bottles. “You can totally drink Maple Bacon Coffee Porter with breakfast with some bacon and pancakes,” enthuses Funky Buddha’s Linn. Narragansett president Mark Hellendrung seconds the sunrise pairing. “I’m not saying you should replace your morning cup of joe with beer every day, but cracking open a cold one at brunch or while tailgating is perfectly acceptable, if not encouraged.”
Here are 11 morning-themed beers worthy of sampling during brunch. Or breakfast. We’re not judging.
1/11Funky Buddha Maple Bacon Coffee Porter
To create this vegetarian-friendly beer (no swine is used) meant to mimic a diner breakfast, the culinary-focused Florida brewery relies on a combination of smoked malts and spices. The brewery also makes draft-only beers inspired by mimosas and French toast.
2/11Fort George Java the Hop
It's commonplace for craft brewers to add coffee to stouts and porters, playing up the dark beers’ inherently roasty profile. More unusual is breweries adding coffee beans to IPAs, most notably in the Oregon brewery’s newest release. It uses citrusy Amarillo hops and Ethiopian coffee to fashion a balanced, gently chocolaty brew.
3/11Rogue Bacon Maple Ale
Cultish Portland, Oregon, bakery Voodoo Doughnuts’ beloved Bacon Maple Bar received a sudsy tribute from Rogue Ales, which turned to smoked malt, maple flavoring and applewood-smoked bacon to create this smoky, lightly sweet riff on the rauchbier. It’s best alongside maple syrup–painted pancakes and sausage.
4/11Samuel Smith Oatmeal Stout
Originally, oatmeal stouts were also advertised as healthy drinks. (In 1904, the British brewery Walker and Homfray’s stated that its oatmeal stout was “suitable for invalids.”) The style was dead by the 1970s, but British brewery Samuel Smith dug it up from the grave in 1980, creating this velvety and bittersweet stout.
5/11Big Boss Brewing Aces & Ates Coffee Stout
Packed with cold-brewed, organic java, the Raleigh, North Carolina, brewery’s winter seasonal is motor-oil dark, chockablock with flavors of well-roasted coffee, chocolate milk, and vanilla beans.
6/11Mikkeller Beer Geek Breakfast
Danish gypsy brewer Mikkeller’s pitch-black, pleasingly thick stout has an intense coffee flavor that’s cut with subtle smokiness and dried cherries. (For another worthy coffee beer, try Santa Fe’s Imperial Java Stout.)
7/11Martin House Day Break
Modeled after cereal, this “four-grain breakfast beer” is brewed with barley, smooth wheat, silky oats, and spicy rye. Lactose and honey provide an appealing sweetness, while the five percent ABV means you can sip several before noon and still retain your wits.
8/11Narragansett Autocrat Coffee Milk Stout
Rhode Island’s official state beverage is coffee milk, which is made by blending dairy with sweetened coffee syrup, most commonly Autocrat. Narragansett blended the syrup with bittersweet milk stout, creating a smooth, dark road paved with chocolate and a smidgen of bitterness. (Note: the beer is sold out and will return in November.)
9/11Rogness Yogi
To craft this exotic amber ale, the Austin-area brewery spices the brew with ingredients commonly found in chai tea, including cinnamon, clove, cardamom, black pepper and ginger. Naturally, Yogi is one meditative beer.
10/11Stillwater / Emelisse Holland Oats
Is it a sly nod to the musical duo, or an ode to the Dutch? Both. Holland Oats, a collaboration between roving American brewery Stillwater and the Netherlands’ Emelisse, contains toasted oats and appelstroop, a thick syrup often spread on pancakes and toast. The result is a moderately sweet amber ale redolent of caramel, citrus, and stone fruit.
11/11Night Shift Bee Tea Wheat Ale
Consider Bee Tea the hybridized offspring of morning and night. The Belgian-inspired wheat ale is brewed with orange honey and orange peel, before being aged with loose green tea. Bee Tea is dry, herbaceous, gently sweet, and altogether refreshing.
