It’s something of a trend to take regular beverages and make them “hard” by adding alcohol. There’s hard root beer, grape soda, orange soda, cream soda, hard lemonades, even hard seltzer water just to name a handful of basic beverages that have crossed over. Now, however, Pabst Blue Ribbon is taking a morning favorite and giving it a buzzy twist with their new Hard Coffee meaning that now you can caffeinate and drink at the same time and maybe get past the question if it’s too early in the day for an adult beverage.
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Per Delish, Hard Coffee is something of a take on the coffee stout, made from Arabica and robusta coffee beans, milk, and vanilla. The resulting malt beverage has a 5% ABV and leans on the sweet side of things, reportedly tasking a bit like an alcoholic Yoo-hoo or a spiked cold brew beverage. It’s an intriguing concept and, according to PBR brand manager John Newhouse, the company sees it as a unique offering.
“Pabst Blue Ribbon has always been a brand that pushes boundaries and celebrates those who experiment and try new things,” Newhouse said. “Hard Coffee is an opportunity for us to pioneer a delicious and fun new drink and give America something unique. We hope everyone loves it as much as we do.”
If Hard Coffee sounds like something you’d like to try, however, you might need to do a little bit of traveling to get it. The beverage is available in 11-ounce cans only in select markets in Pennsylvania, Maine, New Jersey, Florida, and Georgia at this point and it’s not clear at this time when or if there are plans to expand Hard Coffee’s offering nationwide in the future.
Hard Coffee is just the latest unusual beer offering we’ve covered this year. Back in February, Virginia-based brewing company Smartmouth released a Lucky Charms-inspired beer, Saturday Morning Marshmallow IPA that was made with pounds of marshmallows along with tropical fruity Calypso hops to create an adult beverage version of the much-loved sugary cereal. That beer was available only for a limited time and is no longer in production, but Smartmouth’s website has it listed as a “cool brew” that might someday make a comeback.
What do you think about Pabst Blue Ribbon’s Hard Coffee? Will you give it a try? Let us know in the comments below.
