Bad Ideas In Brewing – Donut Beers

donut, Bad Ideas In Brewing – Donut Beers

Bob’s Donuts

Hey, no one’s perfect…as we at American Craft Beer understand better than most. That said, there are some ideas out there that are so monumentally misguided as to boggle the mind. So welcome to another BAD IDEAS IN BREWING…and we’re blaming a lot of poeple for this one!

We weren’t happy to recently learn about a beer brewed with Peeps Easter candy, or about the Oreo beer shakes last summer. Eastern Europe’s vaginal beer idea was atrocious….And the whole Glitter Beer trend needs to stop.

And just because beers brewed with donuts have history…that doesn’t mean that it’s ever been a good idea.

The Beer & Donut Pairing Mythology

Let’s start with a long held assumption that donuts and beer are perfect pairing companions…an argument we reject.

Fatty donuts might seem like a great idea at four in the morning when you’re looking to avoid that inevitable hangover after a night spent power-pounding beer. But switching to coffee (perhaps served in a syringe) with that fried dough confection strikes us as a much smarter move…just sayin.’

And we’ll begrudgingly admit to certain circumstances where beer and donut combinations might make sense…like if you’re Matthew McConaughey and you need to gain 200 lbs. for a movie your making next week.

But otherwise there’s no reason to ever combine donuts and beer…ESPECIALLY WHEN YOU’RE BREWING A BEER!

A Brief (And Somewhat Sketchy) Donut Beer History

Unlike so many “bad ideas in brewing” which quickly blow-up at media outlets only to be quickly abandoned as consumers learn that they totally suck…beers brewed with donuts pop-up from time to time.

donut, Bad Ideas In Brewing – Donut BeersAnd because we’re so desperate for someone to blame, we scoured the internet for who’s responsible for the first beer brewed with donuts, (and truthfully were not sure) but Rouge Ales has an entire series of beers that they did with Portland, Oregon’s Voodoo Doughnuts that can date the donut beer phenomenon as far back as 2013…But maybe it even goes back further,  who knows?

2015 saw Narragansett Beer team up with famed Rhode Island doughnut shop Allie’s Donuts.

In 2017 a number of breweries yielded to their worst impulses and released a donut infused beer. Two Florida breweries, Hidden Springs and Arkane Aleworks reportedly teamed up on a Russian Imperial Stout brewed with Krispy Kreme doughnuts and the law wasn’t brought in.

And that same year, Dunkin Donuts did a beer with Massachusetts’s based Wormtown Brewery and while that beer was more of a coffee-marketing collaboration, we still find the association problematic.

The most recent addition to this disastrous donut beer trend is the soon to be released Funky Monkey Chocolate-Covered Banana Donut Porter, (we’d avoid that beer like the plague for its name alone!), a collaboration Pennsylvania-based Robin Hood Brewing with the unfortunately named Dam Donuts

 

Bottom Line

donut, Bad Ideas In Brewing – Donut BeersThe truth is, in spite of our snark, most everybody likes donuts. But there’s a time and place for them, and that place should never, ever, be in your beer.

And if you truly think that beer gets better with nuanced donut tones… we really don’t know what to say.

Because beers brewed with fat laden and sugared pieces of dough is a truly BAD IDEA IN BREWING …And, like the Alien, one that refuses to die.

 

That idea not a bad enough for you?   There’s more:

BAD IDEAS IN BREWING – BEER MILKSHAKES

BAD IDEAS IN BREWING – RESURRECTING ZIMA

BAD IDEAS IN BREWING – STAG SEMEN STOUT

 

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