Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Food & Drink

6 Craft Breweries That Also Roast Excellent Coffee

Brewing Up More Than Coffee: These Breweries Roast Coffee, Too

Pat Evans
By

Beer could be consumed all day long ( if monks do it, you can too!), but if you’re one of those folks that wants to support a craft brewery at all times (such as, say, at nine in the morning) and still exercise a modicum of moderation, there are options to do it without pounding an amber ale first thing in the morning. How? You can brew up a pot of coffee made by a craft brewery!

Beer and coffee go hand-in-hand, as exemplified by the many great coffee beers on the market. Beyond the use of coffee in a growing amount of beer styles, the two base beverages also share many awesome flavor profiles on their own (there’s a reason coffee malt is a type of malted barley). These similarities also are attractive to brewers and more than a few across the country have started to roast their own coffees, helping diversify their businesses in an ever-more-saturated market and helping offer their loyal customers a way to experience their product at all hours of the day.

Related Guides

Here are some of the best breweries that also roast coffee.

Modern Times

modern times coffee
Modern Times/Facebook

This California brewery opened in 2013 and immediately began both brewing and roasting. Modern Times’ coffee bags are labeled with its signature logo and are sold online, as well as in some of the brewery’s distribution markets. Modern Times even had to expand its roasting operation in 2015 due to high demand. Just like with the beer, Modern Times has also ventured into bourbon barrel-aging coffee beans. The coffee also goes into the beer — the year-round Black House stout shares its name with the house coffee.

Two Brothers

Two Brothers Coffee Roasters
Two Brothers Coffee Roasters/Facebook

When Modern Times launched, the folks there believed they were the second brewery to start roasting behind Two Brothers Brewing in Chicago. Two Brothers Coffee Roasters sources its coffee from across the globe and roasts the beans in small batches and before selling it in retail locations around Chicago, as well as three cafes. The roasting operation has pumped out more than 100,000 pounds in 2018 and has doubled its production each year, to the point where the coffee is even in K-Cups.

Oskar Blues

oskar blues brewery and hot box coffee
Hot Box Roasters/Facebook

Why did Oskar Blues founder Dale Katechis start roasting coffee? Because he could! Oskar Blues is well-known for its use of cans in brewing (in fact, the brewery is largely responsible for starting the trend) and Hot Box Roasters use cans for coffee, too. Cans come in particularly handy for the Nitro Cold Brew, the creamy smooth coffee type that more brewers should be packaging. In addition, Hot Box offers up a subscription service for those in need of a regular fix. Oskar Blues uses its coffee in the Hot Box Coffee Porter, while sister brewery Perrin Brewing brews up Hot Box Brown.

Heritage Brewing

varitas bold cold press coffee
Cold Press Coffee/Facebook

The veteran-owned brewing company in Virginia operates also its sister company, Veritas Coffee. In 2016, it released cold press coffee in cans and, in 2017, opened its first brick-and-mortar location: Heritage Brewing Market Common Brewpub and Roastery. The canned nitro coffees come in bold and blonde varieties.

Red Horn Coffee House & Brewing

Red Horn Coffee House and Brewing Co
Red Horn Coffee House and Brewing Co./Faacebook

Sure, it gets hot in Texas, but that doesn’t mean coffee isn’t needed. In Cedar Park, Texas, Red Horn Coffee House and Brewing offers up its own house-roasted coffee. The crew includes dedicated baristas making sure customers experience the brand’s coffee as intended. It’s rare to have a business put such an equal emphasis on coffee and beer, but Red Horn accomplishes the goal the founders set out when they opened.

Fifth Frame Brewing

Fifth Frame Brewing Co.
Fifth Frame Brewing Co./Facebook

Fifth Frame Brewing started serving its coffee before its beer when it opened in Rochester, New York. The trio of founders had a wealth of experience in both coffee and beer and it’s been put to good use. While the name is an homage to bowling — the fifth frame is apparently the time for a beer — it also references using coffee as the fifth ingredient in beer (joining water, malt, hops, and yeast). Now that Fifth Frame is serving up beers, many of the brews use the house-roasted coffee, including Fauxka, a coffee brown ale.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
This roaster’s $150 cup of coffee sold out in a single day
Would you shell out for a $150 cup of coffee? Turns out, many people would for one of the top-rated roasts
Person roasting coffee beans in a wok

Splurging is a habit we can't seem to kick. Amid a less-the-perfect economy, we still love to eat expensive caviar, collect wildly high-priced spirits bottles, and order drinks with actual gold in them. Creatures of habit, I suppose.

The latest development within the topic? A coffee cup with an asking price of $150. Yes, a Portland coffee roaster offered a rare and limited-run cup of coffee. It goes down as perhaps the most expensive cup of coffee ever. The real question begs: Is it worth it?

Read more
Here’s what drinks pros have learned from Dry January
How do you extend Dry January all year long? We got some advice from the pros
A pair of mocktails.

A new year is upon us and for a lot of people, that means new healthy habits. It might mean a new diet, pre-bedtime sleep ritual, or cutting back on the booze. Often, the plusses of these lifestyle changes are so significant that you hope to continue them well beyond just January.

There are lots of sober curious people looking to take the merits of Dry January all the way through 2023. But it's not easy, especially with our favorite bars back open, friends always looking for an excuse to get out, and some really good cocktails in the mix. So we solicited some advice from drinks industry pros who've done the Dry January thing and learned from it. Here's some of that valuable wisdom, passed on to the new, 2023 version of you.

Read more
The 5 best low-calorie drinks to order at the bar
Low-calorie drinks: Put down the light beer. You're better than that.
Paloma

It's inevitable. With the new year now well underway, most of us will at least be flirting with the idea of getting back into shape after the sugar-filled holiday season. For better or worse, those cookies were delicious, Mom's gravy was silky smooth and decadent, and the mulled wine was flowing. There are plenty of good reasons to clean up our diets come January, whether the goal is to drop a few pounds, or just cleanse our bodies of all of those sugar plums. Some even opt for a Dry January, entirely abstaining from alcohol for the whole of what feels like the coldest, darkest month of the year. If that's your thing, more power to you! We salute you. But for those of us with slightly less willpower who still want to tidy up our systems, there are other, less extreme alternatives.

Simply opting for low-calorie alcoholic drinks is a perfectly reasonable compromise. Instead of a creamy, whipped indulgence with a candy cane rim, maybe just order a vodka soda. A diet gin and tonic sure feels crisp, light, and refreshing after consuming all of Uncle Marv's eggnog. The trick is knowing these healthier alternatives and being prepared when the bartender heads your way.

Read more