Scottish brewery Vault City unveils deep-fried caterpillar cake flavoured beer

A Scottish brewery has celebrated its sixth birthday by creating a double-deep-fried caterpillar cake flavoured beer.

Edinburgh based brewery Vault City, the self titled “mad scientists” of sour beer production, have unveiled the DDF Caterpillar Cake, a stout inspired by the birthday delicacy with a 14.5% ABV.

Inspired by a Portobello chip shop that deep fried a Colin the Caterpillar cake – which the brewery says are “synonymous with birthdays in Britain” – Vault City have introduced the limited time beer to celebrate their sixth birthday.

An operation that started out in a kitchen, the brewer has went on to create a variety of “boundary-pushing” beers – including Strawberry Banana Milkshake, Raspberry Blueberry Bubblegum, Jaffa Cakes, and Iron Brew.

The vegan friendly beer’s flavour has been described as rich, velvety and features indulgent layers of chocolate and vanilla.

Co-founder Steven Smith-May said: “Caterpillar cakes are synonymous with birthdays in Britain. We’re known for taking things a step too far, and we’ve done just that.

“We love experimenting with flavours, and we couldn’t imagine anything better for our sixth birthday than creating a quintessential birthday beer to share with the world.

“After a Portobello chippie deep fried a caterpillar cake we saw a post on X asking if anything was safe from Scottish chippies and we thought, why not make people ask if anything is safe from Scottish breweries?

“Our DDF Stout has proved popular in the past, selling out in less than a day, and I think a big part of that is how rich chocolate flavours carry in a stout – and the stonking ABV.

“So, grab a can of DDF Caterpillar Cake and celebrate Vault City’s sixth birthday with us. If you’ve got a deep fryer to hand, I can guarantee it pairs well with the real thing.”

The announcement of the latest flavour comes after Vault City announced plans to move into a new base seven times the size of its previous Portobello brewery – with the purchase funded by diehard fans of its weird and wonderful creations.

A crowdfunding campaign through the company’s webstore raised £330,000, which allowed them to purchase the new site at BioCampus within the Midlothian Science Zone in Edinburgh.