Apparently there are some things beer doesn't pair so well with — like religious figures.
A chocolate-peanut butter porter from DuClaw Brewing Co. has been removed from a local Cleveland grocery store because of complaints about its controversial name: "Sweet Baby Jesus."
Heinen’s Grocery Stores, with 22 locations around Ohio and Illinois, pulled the offending brew from all of their locations, due to various customers rcomplaining about the name and writing angry letters.
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DuClaw founder Dave Benfield told the Baltimore Business Journal that the name, though perhaps irreverent, was not chosen with the intent to stir controversy. "It’s not meant to be offensive, it’s not meant to be derogatory," he says. "If we thought we’d stepped over the line and offended people, we probably wouldn’t have done it in the first place." Benfield went on to say that, though this is the first time the brand has been pulled from an entire chain, the name will remain. "When we name our beers, it’s really more than liquid, it’s how that beer feels to us," he says. "We don’t censor ourselves because it might cost us dollars.”
Other beer names from the DuClaw company include Morgazm, Guilty Filthy Soul, and Dirty Little Freak.
There has already been some social media backlash over the loss of "Sweet Baby Jesus":
So @heinens pulls a beer called Sweet Baby Jesus because the name is offensive!? Grow a spine people.— Frank DeLuca (@frdeluca) June 18, 2015
Who knows — perhaps, if there's enough clamor, "Sweet Baby Jesus" will be resurrected on store shelves once more.