The Drink

There’s a real outlaw spirit that runs through the Crafted Bean. Up in DeWitt, far from the millennial student population at MSU or the hipsters of Lansing’s REO Town district, Justin Hartig and his team are running one of the area’s most progressive coffee shops.

One of the shop’s cold brews, Wooden Gun, is named for the shoe polish-covered chunk of wood John Dillinger used to escape from prison. Over at the shop’s record player, customers can spin vinyl from musical outlaws ranging from Willie Nelson to Wu-Tang Clan. Among the shop’s menu of non-alcoholic “coffee cocktails” is a tasty concoction named after another musical rebel, Johnny Cash.

The Johnny and June cocktail starts with small batch, locally roasted Columbian French pressed coffee. Then the coffee is blended with Sleeping Bear Dunes raw honey, grass-fed butter and organic peanut butter.

The result is a hot drink that has the consistency of a latte but with a delightful — but not overpowering — mix of honey and peanut butter. Many claim that grass-fed butter, a key ingredient in trendy Bulletproof Coffee, offers benefits like a better energy boost and easier weight loss. I can’t speak to those benefits yet, but I’m willing to drink more Johnny and Junes to test it out — in the name of science, of course.

The Crafted Bean 6 a.m.-9 p.m. Monday-Friday; 7 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday- Sunday 116 Bridge St., DeWitt craftedbeanvip.com