Mike's Mix: Caffeinating For A Cause With Rainbow Brew

Every week, Mike Augustyniak picks up a new cocktail recipe from a local mixologist. In a change of pace this week, he spoke to Cory Weissman and David Birchard about "Rainbow Brew," the coffee with a cause.

For Cory Weissman and David Birchard, partners in business and in life, the one thing that could make a cup of coffee more satisfying is if supported the gay community.

"We were ordering coffee online and we thought 'well, we should order from a gay-owned business,' and we couldn't find one," Birchard said.

So they started their own coffee company.

"We're the Queen's Beans," Birchard said with a laugh.

The first thing the duo did was start a Facebook page, even though the company didn't really exist yet. You could say that the cart came before the horse but, then again, David is a bit of a serial entrepreneur so it all worked out in the end.

In January 2015, Rainbow Brew's campy coffee blends debuted.

"The names of the coffee alone are really interesting… like 'Mornin' Mary', 'Straight Up,' 'Butch Roast,' 'Lipstick & Flannel,'" Weissman said.

Beyond the fun names, the coffee is also roasted to order by their Master Roaster Geoff IkutaSchodde. Co-owner of River Moon Coffee, IkutaSchodde says the process is the coffee equivalent of craft brewing or craft distilling. He says when it comes to quality, size does matter.

"[With] small batch roasting, [and a] smaller sized drum, heat is more evenly distributed through the coffee bean," IkutaSchodde said.

With a two to three-day turnaround time from order to delivery, there's almost no way to get a faster, more vibrant brew.

"You get that peak time when those caramelized flavors come to the surface of the bean, and then after that 10-day peak, those caramelized flavors -- those oils that you see on the top of the beans -- start to disappear." IkutaSchodde said. "The flavors start to diminish."

In addition to providing some of the freshest coffee around, Rainbow Brew also has a mission to give back to the LGBTQ community.

"We created the 'Caffeinated for a Cause' program where... we've gotten involved with Twin Cities Gay Men's Chorus, Clare Housing, Pride, Minnesota AIDS Walk -- we'll be there on May 17th -- and we create a brew or a roast for them, and a portion of every sale goes back to that organization," Birchard said.

The Queen Beans say this is just the beginning.

"We're getting into wholesale, and farmer's markets," Birchard said. "It's happening so fast it's hard to keep up."