What makes a crisp pale ale taste even better? Knowing you're fighting food waste with every sip.
Toast Ale, a craft beer company founded by author and food waste activist Tristram Stuart, collects fresh surplus bread from bakeries that would otherwise hit the trash and uses it to brew a unique kind of beer. The company has made waves in the UK since 2016, donating profits to Stuart's organization Feedback.
Now, with a new Indiegogo campaign, it's finding its way to U.S. shelves this summer. And 100 percent of the proceeds will go to charities fighting food waste.
Americans waste an estimated 72 billion pounds of food every year, but Toast Ale can help. The process is a little different — and a little trickier — than traditional brewing, since the gluten in bread could bind together and result in blocked mash. But Chelsea Craft Brewing Company in New York City, which agreed to brew the pilot batch of Toast Ale in March, developed a recipe that works.
"The reaction we've gotten has totally validated the need for Toast as a solution," Madi Holtzman, an NYU grad student behind the Toast Ale USA campaign, told Global Citizen. "Essentially, every bakery we've reached out to has not only enthusiastically said, 'Yes, we'll bring you our surplus bread,' but has gone to lengths to get their surplus bread to us."
Toast Ale USA hopes to raise $35,000 through the campaign, aiming to have cans of its American Pale Ale in stores by July 4. A partnership with Whole Foods means the grocery chain will sell the beer exclusively for one month.
Bottoms up.
Topics Social Good Sustainability
