Wheaties beer is unveiled: It's a Hefeweizen (duh)

It had to happen. For years, the Wheaties slogan – "breakfast of champions" — has been invoked by beer lovers who pop open an adult beverage before noon. Now the cereal company is putting its name and logo on a beer.

That beer is called HefeWheaties, the result of a collaboration between two Minneapolis companies: cereal-maker General Mills and brewer Fulton Beer. As the name implies, the beer is a hefeweizen, the German style that relies on wheat for its base.

HefeWheaties, we were only somewhat disappointed to learn, does not include actual Wheaties. The beer is unfiltered and comes in a 16-ounce "tall boy" can, Fulton says. It will hit the market on Aug. 26 — but only at Twin Cities locations.

"We'll see how people react to it," says Fulton's Ryan Petz, the brewery's president and co-founder. "If it's something everybody loves, we'll obviously consider doing it again in a bigger and more widely distributed way in the future."

According to the General Mills blog, "The idea for HefeWheaties came up earlier this summer, thanks to some connections between Fulton's team" and some of the cereal-makers' employees.

"It's the first alcohol partnership for Wheaties, General Mills' original cereal, which was born in the 1920s," reports the Star Tribune. But if you're thinking this might start a series of beer-cereal tie-ins, you should think again. When asked on Facebook if a Count Chocula stout might be in the offing, Fulton responded, "That's a negative Ghost Rider." Copyright 2019 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.