Full disclosure:  The Thomas Kemper Soda Company sent me samples of 6 beverages to try and review.  This made me extremely happy, as just a few days prior, I was speculating with my wife on when and if a root beer company would contact me with some samples to review.  Thomas Kemper, you were the first and the bravest!  Thanks to readers that have made this blog popular enough to keep viewing it and making companies take note!

So, to the root beer…I really liked the bottle, it felt like a hefty beer bottle.  I’m guessing this is related to Thomas Kemper Soda Company’s heritage as a spin off from the Thomas Kemper brewery.  Opening the bottle brought a nice pop signifying a decent amount of carbonation. The first swallow brought with it a pretty powerful taste of vanilla, almost overwhelming, even.  This taste note was followed by a more subtle flavor of honey.  The honey together with the cane sugar gave the root beer a very full mouth feel and a strong natural yet almost cloying sweetness.

Image by cbcastro via Flickr

Thomas Kemper has a good story, a good product, well made and crafted, and a great philosophy of using all natural ingredients and no artificial colorings and flavors.  Overall, the root beer was pretty enjoyable, but it wasn’t terribly challenging with it’s flavor, and for my tastes, the vanilla was a little strong without being balanced with some wintergreen or anise.  I could see how this root beer would work very well in a root beer float.

http://www.tksoda.com

Monthly Root Beer Rating: 7

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So, apparently Kutztown has been around since 1851 and is a Pennsylvania institution.  They seem to have been continuously brewing sodas since they built a bottleworks around this time.  One would think that having this ample amount of time to refine, tweak and perfect would make a superior root beer. I wouldn’t fault a person for thinking that way, it’s perfectly logical, right?  It doesn’t seem to work that way in this case, however.  I am quite certain that the good people of Kutztown and it’s surrounding area will wholeheartedly disagree with me when I proclaim that this root beer pretty much tastes like watered down birch beer with caramel coloring and aspertame, but then again, that’s my opinion, right?  The ingredients list yucca and acacia as primary flavorings, along with cane sugar as the only sweetener, however it sure does taste pretty artificial.  I have their sarsaparilla in the fridge too, hopefully that will be better…

The one charming thing was the label, which has a bit of broken English, probably translated from the original German stating: “When you’re bad for something mighty good, reach for a foamy mug of Kutztown Root Beer! Tastes chust like old-fashioned, ’cause you know we make it that way. Drink ’til you ouch, there’s more back!”

Um, yeah.  Wish it was true…

www.kutztownbottlingworks.com

Monthly Root Beer Rating: 3

I reviewed Old Town’s root beer a while back, and remember liking it quite a bit, even if it was a pretty bland presentation in the bottle.  The sarsparilla they’ve produced (interestingly spelled “Sarsparilla” instead of the traditional “Sarsaparilla”) isn’t quite as nice, though it is an enjoyable beverage.  In the first sip, it has a nice bit to it, with an enjoyable amount of carbonation and flavor hitting you right away.  The flavor is fairly mild and smooth and is heavy on the vanilla cream side.  In fact, this sarsaparilla almost reminds me of a cream soda more than other sarsaparillas that I’ve had.  Overall, not bad, but not great.  I think they’re out of business anyway, so it’s kind of a moot point…

Monthly Root Beer Rating: 6

Included in the shipment from Maine was a 16 oz bottle of Moxie.  In fairness to my friend, and even though it’s not a root beer, I thought I’d review it. First impression was: slightly medicinal with a very unusual presentation to the nose. I guess this could technically be a root beer, as it’s only identified flavoring is “gentian root extracts”.  I was warned that this was an acquired taste, and I won’t argue with that after consuming the bottle.

My wife, who is Swedish, introduced me to a soda called Julmust that is available twice yearly in Scandinavia; at Christmas and Easter.  Moxie reminded me a lot of that, however, she disagreed vehemently!

Since this is claimed to be the “oldest continually produced” beverage in America, I can certainly understand the nostalgic appeal in trying the drink, but it will never be on my favorites list…

Monthly Root Beer Rating: 4

So I’m driving around town looking for new root beers and at Earth Fare, I find this.  I didn’t even know it existed.  It comes in a 500ml bottle and has a flip-top cap like old Grolsch bottles.  I split it with my Dad while he was over, and we both had the same reaction:  very flavorful, but don’t taste the nutmeg.  Anyway, this wasn’t that dissimilar from regular Virgil’s, which in it’s own right is a great root beer, but without being that taste differentiated, I’m not really sure why this exists as a special edition, other than the Bavarian water it’s brewed with…

The one taste this did bring to mind was the taste of root beer I can get at my county fair from this dude who brews his own big giant vats and carts it in and sells it for a $1 a cup.  Great stuff, and similar to this.  Worth drinking, but not worth seeking out if you have access to Virgil’s anyway.

Monthly Root Beer Rating: 8

I just found a new favorite!  This root beer is going in my standard “go-to” category along with Dad’s and Bundaberg.  Superior to most other’s I’ve had recently, and all organic at that.  From the first sip to the last swallow, this satisfied and exceeded all expectations.  While their sarsaparilla soda had less flavor than I wanted, the root beer more than made up for it.  Full mouth feel without being too syrupy, not too sweet, but flavors of honey, brown sugar and maybe a little yucca root.  Very little licorice and anise flavoring.  This was firmly carbonated, though not as aggressively as IBC.  The carbonation held solidly through the whole bottle, and was there at the last sip.

I said in the sarsaparilla review that I was very impressed by their fair trade practices and organic ingredients, but it’s worth pointing out again that they’ve gotten it right.  Very well played, Maine Root.  And yes, I’m still looking for that sponsorship…I think Anthony from Anthony’s Root Beer Barrel and I would do you proud…

www.maineroot.com

Monthly Root Beer Rating: 10