Upcycled Beer, The Toast Of Petaluma, Now Available At Lagunitas

PETALUMA, CA— The Lagunitas Brewing Company and Toast Ale, an organization that makes beer brewed with surplus bakery bread, collaborated with local Alvarado Street Bakery to create The Toast of Petaluma, an exclusive, limited-edition brew.

In honor of this initiative, Lagunitas announced it would make a donation to Sonoma Family Meal to feed 200 food-insecure people in the community.

The Toast of Petaluma is a California common lager made with Nova, a new lager yeast strain, moderately dry hopped with Loral and Citra hops, and brewed using surplus imperfect loaves of sprouted sourdough from our friends at Alvarado St. Bakery.

Starting June 7 and continuing through the summer, it is sold exclusively at the Lagunitas Petaluma TapRoom & Beer Sanctuary.

"Together with Toast Ale, we've brewed a delicious beer that also demonstrates our commitment to reducing our environmental impact," said Paige Guzman, Lagunitas’ chief marketing officer. "We take great pride in making positive changes that create a more resilient and sustainable craft brew industry, and we’re on a roll with this new partnership that truly offers a creative approach."

"Brewing Innovative Action For The Planet"

Alvarado St. Bakery took 80 surplus fresh bread loaves that would have otherwise gone to waste and reduced them into crumbs. Lagunitas then brewed the crumbs into 16 kegs of The Toast of Petaluma. Using surplus bread in the grain bill has a 79 percent lower carbon footprint than malted barley and prevents food waste while also reducing demand for malt, according to Lagunitas.

"Food production is the biggest contributor to climate change and biodiversity loss, but one-third of all food is wasted," said Rob Wilson, Toast co-founder & chief toaster. "We have a Big Hairy Audacious Goal of preventing 1 billion slices of bread from being wasted. To achieve that, we’re brewing Toast beer with surplus bakery bread—using 25 percent less malted barley than other beers, and empowering our community of beer lovers to embrace the circular economy."

Since 2016, Toast has avoided 61 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent, freed up 260,000 square meters of land, saved 100,914 gallons of water, and used more than 3 million slices of surplus bread.

Lagunitas is also making a difference beyond this partnership. The brewery sells spent grains and yeast at a significant discount to provide quality nutritional feed to farm animals in its communities. This keeps approximately 12 million pounds of waste out of landfills annually and reduces the demand for crops grown specifically for animal feed. In addition, Lagunitas only works with sustainable suppliers, recycles more than 100,000 pounds of materials per month, uses renewable energy from solar systems and an anaerobic bio-digester, treats 100 percent of its wastewater onsite, and maintains an overall focus on reducing waste.

Break Bread & Grab A Beer

Lagunitas packaged The Toast of Petaluma in a keg format and will offer it locally to minimize serving and distribution emissions. The new tasty brew, alongside other delicious bites, is available 11:30 a.m. - 8 p.m. Wednesday-Sunday at the Lagunitas TapRoom & Beer Sanctuary, 1280 N. McDowell Blvd. in Petaluma.

"It’s good to have friends. Raise a Toast. Save the World. Cheers!"