Wild Bill's Rocky Mountain Root Beer

I just realized something that would be kinda cool. In January, the first month of the year, i reviewed one root beer. In February, i reviewed two. So far this month i have reviewed three. Keeping this trend up would be kinda fun, meaning that in April (the fourth month), i would review four, in May five, and so on. However, when you do the math it comes out 78 root beers for the year, and frankly i only have about half that many on hand and don't know if i could make up the difference. Too bad really, that would have been neat, not to mention a personal best for me as far as the year goes.

Anyway, this one comes to me courtesy of my root beer nemesis. He sent this to me in a trade i did with him  long time ago (i want to say at least a year if not longer ago). It's been sitting in my fridge a while and i am trying to get to the ones i've had the longest. Wild Bill's Soda Pop Co. has been around since 2002 and is based in Bernardsville, NJ. They make several flavors of soda, including root beer. The website says that even though the company hasn't been around long, the founder got the recipe from his grandpa who made soda in his basement. Kind of a sketchy statement, but i suppose back then basements were used for wholesome projects and didn't carry the creepy connotations they do with today's grandpas. The company sells all kinds of stuff along with their soda on the website, and apparently they travel to different events all over the nation (but mostly in the southern states from what i can see in their near future).

I like the label, even if it does come on a clear glass bottle (12 oz.) which normally means the soda isn't very good. It is made to look something like an old-westy type wanted sign complete with a couple bullet holes in it (which are see-through, not black). Its a simple plastic sticker applied to the bottle at a jaunty angle, but it carries a lot of character and color (even though it doesn't have many actual colors). The cowboy figure in on horseback pictured on the label is carrying a mug flowing over with beverage. The website has these stainless steel mugs for sale if you care to drink your root beer that way. Personally, i just like drinking straight from the bottle, but to each his own. (Just so you know though, if you don't drink them this way, you're doing it wrong.)

I have to say, this is a pretty good tasting root beer. I am impressed with it. They use natural ingredients, including cane sugar, and have created an enjoyable beverage. It reminds me a little of Napa Valley Root Beer. Just a little though. There is a good root beer flavor from start to finish. My main complaint is that it isn't very carbonated, and i enjoy me some good carbonation. I was going to give it the benefit of the doubt and say that it has been sitting in my fridge so long that maybe it has lost some carbonation, but the website specifically states that these sodas are purposely made with less carbonation than the big names, because that how this soda "is meant to be enjoyed and experienced." I don't quite agree with that, but that doesn't mean it's not a good root beer. It is quite sweet, and my wife says it's a bit too sweet for her tastes. Luckily, as we all know, you aren't here to listen to what my wife has to say. You can just take that as "constructive criticism" if you'd like since what she says, while i appreciate her input, ultimately doesn't matter. Yeah, that's how i run my household.

My official review is that Wild Bill's Root Beer gets 7 (seven) IBCs. It's almost an 8, i enjoyed it that much. But the intentional lack of carbonation just can't put it over the top for me. Overall though, it's still a good root beer. A rating of 7 is nothing to be ashamed of. I'm liking it. Something tells me you will too, carbonated or not.

Oh, and completely unrelated, but just a heads up today people... beware.

So Duh! Rockin' Root Beer

Ok, i feel a little bad that i have been hammering out generic brands lately, and as it turns out i actually have quite a stockpile of root beers to review right now. Therefore, i hope to increase my posting rate over the next couple months and clear some of these out and get to some root beers that are more unique. So breaking from the recent routine, here is a root beer i picked up at BevMo! here in Tempe, AZ. (Just a little inside scoop, my wife pronounces it "beev-moh", where as i prefer to pronounce it correctly and just as it is spelled as any sane person would logically conclude.) So Duh! is made by a brewing company called Hermitage Brewery in San Jose, CA. Hermitage brews beers and sodas on contract for a pub/brewery called Tied House which has been around since 1987. In my limited research i was unable to determine when Hermitage began, but i will go ahead and say it's probably safe to assume it was the same year. The website goes into detail about the process of brewing and bottling, the contests and accolades won, and lots of other info i didn't really care to get into, but you get the idea.

This root beer comes in a traditional 12 oz. dark glass bottle. The label is quite colorful and eye catching. It pictures a dumb looking blond girl with a puzzled look on her face, obviously to play in with the name. Here is a bit of the caption written on the side of the label out of view in the picture. "Duh" means many things to many people... to us, So Duh! means - "Isn't it painfully obvious this is a delicious craft soda made in small batches with quality ingredients & pure cane sugar." [frankly, i think  that was technically a question, so it should be ended with a question mark(?) and not a period (.)]So if anyone asks, "is that soda good?", we hope you'll say DUH! So anyway, there is that cute little anecdote from the people at Hermitage. Overall, i like the label. It's unique and fun.

But as far as taste is concerned, i am not as impressed. The ingredients listed include honey and vanilla, but all i can really taste is a molasses taste that i don't much care for. It also lacked carbonation, but that may just be because it's been sitting in my fridge for about a year now. It reminded me of another root beer that i can't quite pinpoint right now, but it doesn't really matter cuz it wasn't good either. This also leaves a bad taste in my mouth (literally, not metaphorically). Therefore, i deem it not that great.

My official review is that So Duh gets 3 (three) IBCs. Not that much of a fan. I honestly don't hate it and was considering giving it a 4, but the fact that it leaves such a bad taste in your mouth made me give it a 3. Not a fan.

HEB "Old Fashioned" Root Beer

Ok, so i know i just reviewed this generic brand, but it turns out there are two official versions of this generic. And while they are both in fact called HEB "Old Fashioned" Root Beer, the difference is that this one is made with cane sugar. So i am just using the "Old Fashioned" title on this one to distinguish it from the other one. If you haven't read my post on HEB, i'll just fill you in on a few basics (since this won't be much different from the other one). HEB is the name of a grocery store based in Texas and is an acronym for "Here Everything's Better". I picked this one up in Houston on a road trip with my friend Richard. Here is the website.

I enjoy the label on this can better than i did on the bottle of regular HEB. That label just seemed so much more... generic. The same color scheme is used, but this one features a nice root beer bottle cap (something i am a small collector of) with the name of the root beer printed in old timey font. It's much more aesthetically pleasing than the 2 liter label.

I know i am rushing through this, but i feel like it's just a repeat of my last post (which was also very short and bland). I will say that as far as taste is concerned though, i enjoy this one more than the root beer with high fructose corn syrup. I think it has more of an original flavor, in so much as it is not a blatant rip off of A&W. It has a good root beer core with a nice vanilla finish. My wife says she likes the other one better. Either way, they are both good, and to be fair, i only moderately enjoy this one better. No big sweeping difference though.

My official review is that HEB Old Fashioned gets 7 (seven) IBCs. While i do like it more, it's not by much. And while this is an enjoyable root beer, it's definitely not an 8 IBC root beer. Therefore i can rate it no higher or lower than the HEB root beer containing high fructose corn syrup. However, given the choice on the spot, i would choose this one.

H-E-B Root Beer

This is another root beer i picked up on my last cross country trek with my friend Richard. We passed through Texas and in Houston we stopped at a grocery store to look for root beers. This is one of the ones we found. I don't have a website for the root beer, but store is called H-E-B (an acronym for "Here Everything's Better") and this is the website for the store. The label says this is bottled in San Antonio, but i don't know how long it has been around or anything. Not really important though. This is just another stop on the generic root beer assembly line so i can't expect to find out a lot of the details about it. I doubt much thought went into crafting this beverage in the first place.

I chose to pick this up in a 2-liter bottle since it was the cheapest option. The label is pretty standard for a generic root beer. Same tired bland format, repetative color scheme, and lack of imagination i've come to expect from a store brand. Pretty unremarkable really.

For as much as it sounds like i am getting down on this one, i have to say it tastes pretty dang good. And that's because it's another exact copy of A&W. I've said it before plenty of times, and this one just proves the point: if you're going to make a generic soda that you just want to make money on, you might as well copy the flavor of a popular and winning formula. H-E-B does this with incredible authenticity. My wife now feels as though A&W is just a whore, giving it's recipe to any willing buyer. Personally, i don't really care.

My official review is that H-E-B gets 7 (seven) IBCs. I realize this review is short, but really, i don't have much to say about this one. I think with root beers like this, you basically just want to know if it's good or not. And it is, so i will give it the same score as i gave A&W (cuz they taste the same). So there you have it. It's cheap, it's good, and it's in Texas. The end.

Shine Classic Root Beer

There is a line of grocery stores here called Fresh & Easy, which coincidentally is what i occasionally call my wife. It's a chain of smaller grocery stores that are supposedly more personal and sell local produce and what not, or something to that extent. Personally, i don't do much shopping there. I went in once and wasn't too impressed with the particular store i visited, but i have been to other ones which were nicer. Anyway, that's not really the point of this post. The point is that i ventured in one day to pick up some ice cream because it was on the way to another engagement and i stumbled upon their generic store brand in a happy accident. Well, maybe not happy. Not sad, but... just kind of middle ground i suppose. It's called Shine Classic Root Beer, a brand i had never heard of previously, and true to it's generic nature it comes in basically every flavor in the soda spectrum. Unfortunately (but not surprisingly) i never found a website for it. It's that lame of a product i suppose. But whatever. It just means i have no extensive details on the origin or distribution of this beverage. I see on the label that it is bottled by Cott Beverages out of Tampa, FL. But truthfully, it probably doesn't matter cuz this stuff really isn't worth going out of the way for. Oh no, did i give it away too early?

I chose to pick up a 2 liter bottle instead of a 12 pack of cans. It embodies the generic root beer mantra down to the label style. Brown and silver design, some bubbles, and kind of a new age font, though this stuff is anything but cutting edge. It lacks a lot of imagination and if i weren't meticulously scouring the root beer section of every store i go in this one probably wouldn't have grabbed my attention.

I had a reasonable expectation for this one when i opened the bottle. The release of carbonation allowed a familiar A&W aroma to permeate the air and i was thinking i would be treated to another decent knock off of a true classic. However, i got much less than i bargained for. It honestly tastes like nothing. Not root beer, not soda, not anything. It's almost like drinking water, except not refreshing. It really does smell good, and i must admit there is a split second of remote root beer flavor right as it hits your tongue, but that fades so quickly that it almost doesn't register. Ultimately, i am left feeling cheated and bored. And i still have 2 liters of this crap to finish off.

My official review is that Shine Classic gets 3 (three) IBCs. Maybe i am being a bit harsh on this one. My wife seems to think so. But i really disappointed by it. So i couldn't in good conscience cut it any slack. Plus, it left a really bad taste in my mouth (also typical of generic brand). Yeah it's cheap, but don't waste the time or money. This one is simple not "woth it". (spelled wrong intentionally)

Ward's Root Beer

Hello root beer enthusiasts... i know it has been a couple months since i have posted and for that i apologize, but the good news is i just took a cross country trip with a friend and rounded up several more root beers to go through. Not promising a high volume of posts, but hopefully i will have less breaks in between. Anyway, we planned our trip so that we would pass along the southern united states from North Carolina to Arizona. Unfortunately we only made it as far as Baton Rouge, LA before Richard's car broke down and i had to catch an early flight home for work and school. BUT!... luckily we did pass through Mississippi before that, and that is where today's root beer hails from. Ward's is a chain of fast food restaurants in Mississippi. I heard about Ward's a few years ago from one of my friend's little sisters. She had married a guy from Mississippi and they knew i was doing this blog and told me i had to try the root beer there. He was emphatic that it was fantastic, but I figured i would probably never get a chance to get down there since i had no reason to go to Mississippi. Then my friend Richard moved across country and asked me if i'd help him drive, so i told him as long as i could plan out the route i was up for it.

Talking about the Ward's restaurant we visited in Gulfport, MS i can't say much. It was really small and typical of a fast food restaurant in structure and arrangement. We were there at 7:00 in the morning, but they served their entire menu all day. So naturally, Richard got the deep fried shrimp plate and i got a burger and fries. The fries were decent, but the burger was super bland. We didn't expect much though. Most of the reviews we read about the place said the food was not good (and they were right).

We both got drinks with our meal and helped ourself to the root beer that was so highly recommended. Normally this is the part of the blog where i talk about the bottle or can and the label, but this was just in a fast food fountain cup (not sure the volume in liquid oz.) and the label is the dumb Ward's logo on the cup in red and yellow. A triangle, some writing, you get the point. No big deal and nothing to get all excited about. i photoshopped the "root beer" onto the cup in the picture above just to make sure everyone knew what i was drinking. Also for me in case i forget. I sometimes do that.

Does Ward's live up to the hype of one guy i met a few years ago that is married to my friend's sister? Not really. It's not a bad taste, but i'm not a fan. I think i can nail it dead on by saying it tastes like syrup. Not like soda fountain syrup you mix with carbonated water to make soda, like syrup you put on your pancakes. Like maple syrup. It tastes exactly like a pancake. And it is SWEET. Too sweet. Way way too sweet. Now, i don't mind pancakes. I prefer waffles, but in both cases i use a generous amount of syrup. However, what i don't do is drink syrup directly from the bottle, which is basically what drinking this root beer was like. It was so rich and sweet that neither Richard or I could finish our cups and poured them out  about a third the way through to get something else a little less... diabetes inducing.

My official review is that Ward's gets 4 (four) IBCs. Like i said above, just way too sweet. Not a fan. It's not that it tasted bad, but i couldn't even finish the cup, and for that i couldn't even bring myself to give it a 5. I don't know how you would make this better (or even bearable). Maybe thicken it up and pour it on some pancakes? No, that would be ridiculous. Everyone knows waffles are better.

Surf City Root Beer

I wanted to review this one now for a couple reasons... one, it's been sitting in my fridge for well over a year now. Two, i feel like i have been phoning it in with boring reviews lately cuz i have nothing to say about the root beers i have reviewed lately, but this one comes from a really cool place i will talk about shortly. And three, my wife was supposed to bear our first child two days ago. Sadly, he's turtling and refuses to come out, making my wife increasingly miserable as he's just getting bigger the longer he stays in there. I swear we're going to have to pull him out by his feet while he maintains his kung fu grip on my wife's uterus and fights leaving his now cramped confinement. So what does that have to do with this root beer? Well although it's called Surf City, it is made at a place in Huntington Beach, CA called Brewbakers, and to me, that sounds like Babymakers. It's a stretch, i know, but sometimes my writings are desperate for clever, even poor showings like this one. Anyway, Brewbakers is a cool little spot in Huntington. I learned that they had their own root beer and thought it was a restaurant, but when my wife and i went there with some friends of ours last summer we found that it really wasn't geared toward being a restaurant. They did serve some food items (bread, pizza, pretzels and the like), but what draws customers there is the opportunity to individually brew their own little batches of beer (or root beer) using ingredients and recipes on hand. It was a really neat idea, and had we known we would have booked the time to actually make some Surf City ourselves. I have posted some pictures of the inside of the place, which is quite small but very neat.

There is basically just a long table in the middle of the room right when you walk in with a lot of bowls and weights and measures on it. Below the table are cabinets with large bins of ingredients; grains, flour, sugar, etc.

Along the right wall are several small kilns. Not sure if that's what they call them, but it's where the batches are brewed. To the left of of the counter is the cash register and bottles of different brews for sale. I would totally book the time to brew my own batch next time i'm in Huntington cuz it looks like a fun little evening activity to do with friends. As you can see from the pictures, it was pretty packed for how small the place is. Needless to say, this place is pretty popular.

The bottles are dark brown 12 oz. glass with no labels. The label you seen the one in the picture at the top is another one of my hack photoshop jobs. We bought two 3-packs because there were 4 of us and they don't specifically have 6-packs. Regardless, we got what we came for. They do other flavors as well, including a sarsaparilla, but i don't review those even though we did drink a couple. As far as the label i put on there, it's the logo of the soda line they create at Brewbakers. However, the other cool thing about the place is that you can actually design your own labels that go on your brewed batch. So if you decide not to go by a recipe on hand and make your own concoction and want to bottle and label it afterward, they are all set up to allow you to do that. Pretty cool set up. We were impressed.

As far as the taste goes, it's pretty good. It has a really nice aroma when you open the bottle, not much carbonation (although it HAS been sitting in my fridge for a year and i'm not sure the seal on the bottle kept it all in), and it doesn't taste like a cheap generic or a natural brand or anything. It's made with real sugar and is fairly sweet, and i can taste the anise which i don't normally care for but don't mind in this case. It's not an overwhelmingly obvious root beer taste, but it definitely works. By no means bad, and i think had i brewed it myself i would have enjoyed it that much more.

My official review is that Surf City gets 7 (seven) IBCs. I'm not particularly blown away with the taste. It's good, but not outstanding. But i must say most of my rating is applied toward the unique nature of the endeavor and the fact that is can be customizable and changed with each batch based on the taste preferences of the one making it. If you're ever in Huntington, look this place up. I'll definitely book some brew time next time i'm there.