Mothfire Brewing Up Some Really Good “RoHo Joe” Stout

A beautifully tasty new dark beer at the Roadhouse!

By Ari Weinzweig

When people you love and a wonderful local brewery decide to make stout with your coffee, and it turns out to be more delicious than you could ever have imagined … that’s most certainly a good thing! Over the last few months, the folks at Mothfire Brewing Co. here in town have been turning the Coffee Company’s Roadhouse Joe into an amazing full-bodied dark beer! Kudos to the crew at Mothfire for their skill in making it happen, and compliments to the Coffee Company for having such well-roasted coffee for them to work with!

Why our RoHo Joe Stout is so delicious!

When you sip the stout, the coffee comes through without dominating the whole drink; it hints clearly of coffee, and yet it’s something else altogether. The RoHo Joe Stout has got a good hint of vanilla, a touch of sweetness, and all the grain forward fullness you’d expect in a good stout! It’s exceedingly drinkable and eminently delicious! Noah Kaplan from Mothfire shares:

We believe that craft breweries are an essential part of a community’s culture. A place to create beers and atmospheres that are truly unique to the region, and a place to bring people together. We focus on collaboration, creativity, and quality craftsmanship. We also focus on using local ingredients and building on local culture. We love to dream up beers and relentlessly work on refining them. When we wanted to create a coffee stout, we immediately thought of Zingerman’s! Led by our head brewer, Alexis Jorgensen, we worked on the recipe while sitting outside on the picnic tables at the Roadhouse. We reached out to the Zingerman’s team and we began the collaboration.

We wanted to create the perfect base stout to match the bold, bright flavors of the Roadhouse Joe Coffee. The base of this brew starts out like all our beers, with 100% Michigan farmed and malted base malts. For this stout, we selected a Pale 2-Row base malt from Great Lakes Malting Company in Traverse City, MI. Next, we layer in the specialty malts … Chocolate Wheat for notes of cocoa and coffee—it also contributes an incredible rich darkness. Black malt and roasted barley to deepen the roast with slight bitterness, Caramel 120 Lovibond for pronounced caramel, burnt sugar, raisin, and prune flavors; and finally, flaked oats for enhanced body and a round mouthfeel.

After the detailed selection of grain, yeast, and hops, we brewed our base stout. When fermentation was complete, we added the Roadhouse Joe blend of Zingerman’s coffee and whole vanilla beans and let them steep in the stout. The result is the bodacious RoHo Joe Stout. A beer created to be enjoyed at the Roadhouse. It is a true honor to work alongside Zingerman’s, an Ann Arbor staple and a beacon of the highest quality food and drink. Cheers!

Guinness began brewing its world-renowned stout in Dublin all the way back in 1759. Two and a half centuries later, it’s hard to imagine being in Ireland without seeing someone drinking a pint of it at the local pub! My hope is that this new RoHo Joe Stout can, in the years to come, become a signature item that you “have to have” if you come to our little town! Stop by the Roadhouse soon, grab a pint, and make a toast to a terrific townie collaboration!