La Crosse brewery releasing 'Hot For Chancellor' beer after UW-La Crosse chancellor was fired for appearing in porn videos

Wisconsin breweries can turn just about anything — and we do mean anything — into a beer.

Take La Crosse's 608 Brewing Company, for example. It's debuting a brew called "Hot For Chancellor" Tuesday, the craft brewery announced in a Monday Facebook post.

This comes about a week and a half after the University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents unanimously fired UW-La Crosse Chancellor Joe Gow after discovering videos posted on porn websites featuring him and his wife.

The beer's can features a cartoon chancellor running — cap and gown flying off — while carrying a bowl of fruit, according to the image the brewery posted on Facebook. Both Gow and his wife are vegans.

A block with the word "censored" is covering a certain area of the cartoon, if you catch our drift.

"Hot For Chancellor" is a fruited sour with cherries, apricots, peaches and vanilla, according to 608 Brewing Company owner and head brewer Phil Humphrey. He described the brew as "a little tart, not super sour." It has a 5% ABV.

With 608 dropping one or two new beers a week, its team is always on the hunt for new ideas. The brewery has released more than 460 brews since making its debut over five years ago, Humphrey said.

"We like to have fun here," Humphrey said. "We feel like we make pretty good beer. And then, if we can get creative with our packaging. The fact we do so many things, we invest a lot of time and money into our designs and everything. We try to stay relevant when things are going on."

When the news of the chancellor broke, 608 already had a sour beer in the works in its tank. Within a week, the brewery was able to have the label cranked out, which is "pretty fast and pretty hard to do," Humphrey said.

The brewery ended up making a 7-barrel batch of the beer — about half went into cases of cans and half into kegs, Humphrey said. The cans were packaged Tuesday morning.

"Hot For Chancellor" will be available at the brewery, 83 Copeland Ave., starting Tuesday and until it sells out. Its hours are 3 p.m. to 9 p.m. Mondays through Wednesdays, 3 to 10 p.m. Thursdays, noon to 11 p.m. Saturdays, and noon to 7 p.m. Sundays.

The new brew can be purchased in four packs ($22) or on draft in the taproom (around $9 for a pint).

While January is usually a slow month for beer buying, Humphrey said, there "might be a chance that kegs make it out into the wild to other craft beer bars."

"We cooked up a new beer from our favorite chancellor!!!!" the brewery captioned a promo video posted to Facebook Friday. "Available early next week. Do yo thang Joe!!!!"

More on former UW-La Crosse Chancellor Joe Gow

Gow, the UW-La Crosse chancellor since 2007, and his wife, Carmen Wilson, created sex videos, sometimes with adult film stars, and posted them on pornography websites. They have also self-published two books about their experiences, using pseudonyms.

On Dec. 27, the UW Board of Regents fired Gow, 63, as chancellor for his "abhorrent" and "reckless" behavior, and for subjecting his university to "significant reputational harm." Wilson, 56, was also removed from her unpaid position as associate to the chancellor.

Gow was eager to defend himself, making a First Amendment argument that the termination infringes on his free-speech rights.