Third Street coffee beer is stronger, bigger

Muggsy Lauer's favorite drink is coffee.

So much so that the 1982 Apollo High School graduate runs a wholesale coffee roastery at 408-37th Ave. N in St. Cloud called Muggsy's Beans.

"My second favorite thing to drink is beer," Lauer said.

Now, a coffee bean caricature of Lauer holding a coffee cup will be featured on a new Third Street Brewhouse beer label.

And the 9.1 percent alcohol imperial coffee porter called Cool Beans featuring Muggsy's beans will debut in 750-milliliter bottles next week.

"This is a dream come true," said Lauer, who attended St. Cloud State University. "I'm very much into craft beers. I'm super, super thrilled to get it going."

Third Street Brewhouse Vice President and General Manager Doug DeGeest said a release party for the product will be next week. The other two caricatures on the label are Third Street brewers, who will be identified via a Facebook contest.

Cool Beans is the first in a planned line of specialty beers that will commemorate the third anniversary of Third Street's Cold Spring brewhouse and rebranding efforts.

Thanks to 2011 legislation, Minnesota breweries are allowed to sell 750-milliliter containers as retail out of their taproom.

"I'm dubbing it our big beer series," said DeGeest. "It's not an official name, but we are going to do big beers. They will have bigger alcohol, bigger styles and (be) in bigger (than a standard 12-ounce) bottles.

"We thought this would be a good winter launch. A beer that's warm and fuzzy and takes the winter blues away."

Third Street had previously experimented with infusing coffee beans in products for local bars. His coffee beans are featured in a variety of local cafes, restaurants, bars, churches and at his alma mater, in the Apollo High School coffee shop.

Lauer said his mother would put a dash of coffee in his bottle when he was a baby.

"Not something a responsible parent would do today, but hey it was the 1960s," Lauer joked. "I then, like many other Americans, grew up on your Folgers canned coffee."

But his coffee preferences changed when he tried a Tanzanian peaberry coffee in the 1990s at a former St. Cloud coffee shop called Sano's. Lauer said he's been roasting for the past 15 years and opened Muggsy's Beans in 2007.

This isn't the first partnership Third Street Brewhouse has had with a local wholesaler. The brewery also has the exclusive maple syrup contract with St. John's Abbey.

The syrup is featured in Third Street's annual winter seasonal maple stout called Sugar Shack. DeGeest said the syrup is also planned to be featured in a currently unnamed non-alcoholic craft root beer that will debut in 2015.

"We're always looking for new opportunities to work with local partners," DeGeest said. "That's very important to us."

For more beer news, follow Jake Laxen on Twitter @jacoblaxen.

MORE BEER READING

•The definitive history of Central Minnesota brewing: http://on.sctimes.com/1zLgFsg

•The photo gallery of Central Minnesota's brewing past: http://on.sctimes.com/16FQ869

•Granite City Food & Brewery's released a January seasonal called John's Mom's Cookies: http://on.sctimes.com/1AjjC3M​