2011 in review
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
A New York City subway train holds 1,200 people. This blog was viewed about 5,800 times in 2011. If it were a NYC subway train, it would take about 5 trips to carry that many people.
Trader Joe’s Vintage Cola
This cola doesn’t have caffeine. Huh? I seriously don’t get it. I thought that was part of the point of cola, right? I guess not. Anyway, this soda lacks that certain uniqueness that cane sugar Coke has, or the excellent distinguished flavor of Pig Iron Cola. There’s simply nothing special about this, although it was slightly reminiscent of Julmust. I wouldn’t buy this again, sorry.
Monthly Root Beer Rating: 2
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Jones Pomegranate Cream Soda
Photo Credit: JoeinSouthernCA (http://www.flickr.com/photos/joebehr/)
Yeah, I don’t know about this one, peoples. It was a “limited edition”, and perhaps for a reason. The caption on the bottle said that Jones “captured winter in a bottle”. That’s probably true if winter tastes like a sickly sweet overly creamy soda that barely tastes like the fruit it’s named after. My wife liked it and that’s never a good sign…
Monthly Root Beer Rating: 2
http://www.jonessoda.com/files/products-canned.php
http://www.jonessoda.com/files/products-glass.php
Contains: carbonated water, inverted cane sugar, natural and artificial flavors, caramel color, phosporic acid, sodium benzoate and potassium sorbate (as preservatives).
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Wild Bill’s Rocky Mountain Root Beer
Awesome. I love it when this happens. When cool people who love root beer send me free root beer. In this case, it was the good folks at Wild Bill’s. It’s even better when it turns out to be good stuff and I don’t have to slag it in the interest of honest reviewing!
I wasn’t familiar with Wild Bill’s before now, and they’ve got a pretty cool back story (I’ll let you read it yourself – link below). It seems to be not yet widely available, and the guy I spoke to, Donald, says they’re working hard on distribution.
On to the soda: At first sip, it was smooth with a slight carbonated crispness. It’s full of unique yet understated rooty flavors, and the ingredients list details such exotics at quillaia, acacia and yucca. While these are not that uncommon in a quality root beer, quality root beers seem harder to come by these days. In some ways it reminds me of Dad’s root beer. I mean the good original Dad’s, not the HFCS stuff. I handed it to my wife for a sip and she said: “it all tastes like root beer to me, but this one has a nice interesting flavor that isn’t overwhelmingly sweet”. Guys, you have no idea how big a compliment that is.
All in all, a surprising pleasure, and one I’ll be returning to. Donald provided me a sampler of other flavors they make, and I’m looking forward to seeing if the others are as good as the root beer!
*Soda was provided by manufacturer for promotional review
Monthly Root Beer Rating: 8.5
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Sioux City Root Beer
While this is better than their Sarsaparilla, which was pretty weak and flavorless, it’s not too far off. This isn’t a bad root beer, it smells nice, has a really nice head, but it’s just simply average. It’s fairly watered down tasting, and there’s not much of a mouthfeel. The bottle is really cool, though, and has a nice almost embossed-looking etch of a gunslinger that made me go “pew-pew” in my head while drinking it.
http://www.whiterockbeverages.com/SiouxCity.cfm
Monthly Root Beer Rating: 4.5
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Pennsylvania Dutch Birch Beer
Pennsylvanians are a proud and stubborn bunch. I think they may have gotten that way from drinking this stuff. It tastes a bit like chewing on a tree. A heavily carbonated tree, but a tree nonetheless. This is an old recipe, but has shifted along the way to include high fructose corn syrup, and not too successfully in my opinion. This beverage is quite odd; it’s a bright reddish color, much like the red on the label and is super-sticky if you accidentally spray it all over your kitchen by dropping it. Or so I heard… It’s got 41g of sugar in one 12oz can, but isn’t very sweet at all, and to me, it smells like mineral spirits. You know, the stuff you use to clean paint brushes with.
You should probably try this if you see it anywhere, simply because it’s pretty unique, but I won’t be drinking it regularly.
Monthly Root Beer Rating: 5
Natural Brew Draft Root Beer
I get all excited when I find natural sodas. I expect that they are going to be fantastic and flavorful and all healthy and stuff. I think Einstein said that the definition of insanity is to do the same thing again and again and expect a different result (I’m paraphrasing). I must be totally insane by now, because none of these natural sodas are cutting it for me. This brew advertises itself as being “brewed in small batches with a complex flavor of bourbon vanilla extract, anise, sarsaparilla, licorice root, birch oil, wintergreen oil and other natural flavors“.
I think in this case they might have benefited from a slightly simpler recipe. All these flavors together are pretty ambitious, and it just came out tasting kind of hollow and metallic. I had two of these and poured the second one out, if that tells you anything.
Monthly Root Beer Rating: 2
Frostop Orange & Creme
I keep reviewing these non-root beer beverages for my own diversification’s sake. Also, because I hope to find a secret fantastic hidden soda I had never heard about before. As as a result, I scour a lot of discount and knock-off stores looking for oddities that might turn out to be hidden gems. This soda from Frostop isn’t one of them. All orange and very little (if any) creme left this beverage with a harsh sweetness that wasn’t pleasing to me at all. It wasn’t the worst thing I’ve had, so it did have a few redeeming qualities. Perhaps it’s just that I don’t like orange drinks…
Monthly Root Beer Rating: 3
Bulldog Root Beer
Everyone loves this root beer. By default, that makes me want to not like it, just to be contrarian. However, in this case, I’ve failed myself. Bulldog Root Beer is right up there with the best. I was a bit skeptical at first that it was bottled by Orca Beverages, as they seem to be hit or miss for me with the brands they fulfill bottling for. The flavor of this root beer was full and long lasting with a nice balance of honey and vanilla. Cane sugar and maltodextrin gave the beverage just the right sweetness and full mouth feel without being thick and overly sweet. The carbonation was strong enough to notice, but not overwhelming and lasted throughout the bottle (although the bottle didn’t last long). Nicely done, Bulldog! You’ve won a fan!
Monthly Root Beer Rating: 9.5
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Americana
I was surprised by this root beer. I got it as part of a a sampler pack of vintage sodas and quite frankly wasn’t expecting much. What I found was a pretty flavorful and robust root beer. I think this brew tastes a bit like old school A&W and has what I would describe as a “typical root beer taste”. By this, I mean that it’s a nice mix of sassafras, licorice and honey that will please most but carries a full flavor for a more *ahem* discerning palette. It was fairly sweet and carried a nice carbonation that wasn’t overwhelming. Definitely worth a try!
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