Walgreens Frosty Root Beer

So i've run into a bit of a dilemma... My loyal readers know better than anyone that the regularity of my reviews has fallen behind over the past few months. The reason for this is three fold; 1) i am currently enrolled in school full time and work full time, so i am rarely home to start with. 2) i am running out of resources as far as new root beers to try that are distributed in my area. 3) Jenn got me a PS3 for Christmas, and let's just say the little time i have to play gets priority over a lot of things (much to my wife's dismay). So with all these factors weighing on my conscience, i have decided to do something i originally said i wasn't going to do... i will allow reviews for store brand root beers (such as this one, Walgreens Root Beer). I didn't want to do this because these stores don't devote themselves to root beers, or even soda. They just try and carve out a piece of the pie with a crappy root beer. But i figure crappy or not, they are root beers, so i'll include them. Anyway... Everyone knows what Walgreens is. It's a drugstore/convenience store/everything store that's all over the U.S. Not my first stop when i want to grab a drink. When i looked on the site for a link to the root beer, i found Dad's flavored throat lozenges and a root beer flavored child laxative, which sadly i will not be reviewing. But it turns out they actually sell two distinct root beers in addition to a lot of the common ones. And by distinct, i mean they are made specifically for and distributed through Walgreens. I will review the other one also, but let's look at the Walgreens brand right now, shall we?

It is sold in a 20 oz. plastic bottle not unlike those root beers found in gas stations. The label is extremely plain and just screams cheap and generic. I don't feel very inspired by it and it doesn't give me much hope, which as we all know is the principle purpose of a root beer label. It's just brown with some writing on it. Boo. It's the kind of label that you say has a great personality. Don't worry little root beer label, someone out there will love you...

Going in with low expectations isn't a bad thing cuz the only place to go from there is up. It's not a bad tasting root beer. It actually reminds me a lot of another root beer, and i want to say AJ Stephens. There is just something about it that tastes kinda weird. It's not the initial taste, and i don't think it's the after taste. i think it's the in-the-middle taste. Just has a weird... something... to it. Other than that, it's fine. Decent root beer flavor and good carbonation.

My official review is that Walgreens Root Beer gets 5 (five) IBCs. My wife seems to like it quite a bit and insisted that i give it at least a 6, but then i insisted that she not give me input until she cooks me dinner. We have an understanding; i write the reviews and she makes me food, and neither of us can tell the other how to do their job. Needless to say, she never gets to give me input. Works for us. Anyway, a 5 is more than i was expecting this root beer to achieve. So if you find yourself in Walgreens, go ahead and give it a shot i guess, but don't make a special trip or anything. Unless you need some laxative.

P.S. Jenn's cousin Tyler thinks the PS3 looks like a George Foreman Grill. I'll just say i can't disagree with him.

Addendum 8/18/2012: i was tipped off to a couple new root beers that could be found at Walgreen's, but it turns out that Walgreen's just renamed both the root beers they distribute. This one was renamed Nice! root beer. My wife said i should try and pull a fast one on all my loyal readers and just review them as if they were new and original. That's because she thinks you're all stupid. Silly wife. I figured i wouldn't insult you like that and just pass on the info. The rating is unaffected by this change.