Re-use your loaf! Our food charity joins brewery to make bread beer

The Standard has teamed up with a craft brewery to create a pale ale using leftover bread.

The charity beer is made with loaves donated by The Felix Project, the food waste charity launched during the Food for London campaign.

Named Bread Banger, it was concocted by the Weird Beard craft brewery with Standard proprietor Evgeny Lebedev.

Weird Beard will donate half the profits to The Felix Project, which collects fresh surplus from supermarkets, wholesalers and other food suppliers and delivers it to front-line charities in London.

Mr Lebedev had the idea when he was looking for a new pale ale to serve in The Grapes, the pub in Limehouse he owns with Sir Ian McKellen. Knowing The Felix Project often receives more bread than it can give away, he suggested using some of the surplus to make beer.

The result is a light and fruity summer ale with a flavour enriched by the bread, all of which is toasted before the brew. Mr Lebedev said: “The expert brewers at Weird Beard have surpassed themselves with this incredible-tasting beer. Though Bread Banger alone will not solve the world’s huge food waste problem, it does offer compelling demonstration of the amazing things that can be achieved when humans think imaginatively about waste.

“I am also very proud to be raising money for The Felix Project, a charity which I know is providing a lifeline to some of London’s poorest residents.”

Located in Hanwell, a short drive from The Felix Project’s west London headquarters, Weird Beard Brew Co was the obvious partner brewery for the project.

At the brew day, where he and his colleague Natasha Wolf added the bread to a mix of water and malt, head brewer Bryan Spooner said: “I pretty much live on toasted sandwiches, so it’s fantastic to brew an interesting new beer made from bread, while also doing some good work for charity.”

The Felix Project’s founder Justin Byam Shaw, chairman of the Standard, said: “This is a brilliant way to use old bread and completely delicious too. Thank you, Weird Beard!”

Bread Banger will be available from selected pubs and shops from next Monday.