Bedford's Root Beer

This is another root beer i ordered from the Soda Emporium. Bedford's Root Beer comes from Port Angeles, WA and has been around since 1984. I know this because it says so right on the label. The root beer is currently distributed through Orca Beverages, same as Red Arrow Root Beer. Little else is known by me about this root beer, but the name Bedford's is a little generic. There are tons of things that come up in Google when you enter Bedford's... a roofing service, a town in England, several inns/motels in various locations, and even some weird oceanic creature called a flatworm, which is just one more reason i hate everything in the ocean. But finding more info on the root beer named Bedford's was more difficult for me than all these other (un)interesting topics sharing the same name. For the most part though, i got what i wanted straight from the bottle.

This root beer comes in a classic (i've taken to calling it classic now, cuz i'm fancy) 12 oz amber glass bottle. The label isn't over the top amazing, but it is eye-catching. The big letter B in the center swirled in what appear to be some kind of vines or something draws your attention away from the fact that this is probably the only root beer i've seen where the name "Bedford's" is actually below the words "Root Beer". So reading in the traditional Western practice of left to right, top to bottom, it reads Root Beer Bedford's. A little clunky for my liking, but it's all about what you're used to i suppose. For example, here in America we would call the longest river in the country the Mississippi River. In contrast, over lovely friends over in England call the river dividing the city of London the River Thames. Neither is wrong, just a different way of saying it i suppose. I suspect it's part upbringing and part preference. But just between you and me, those people over in England are saying it wrong.

This stuff isn't half bad. It's quite sweet (made with pure cane sugar) and has a faint molasses taste to it, but it's not unpleasant. It has a good root beer flavor and decent carbonation. The flavor does fade fairly quickly though, and it leaves a bit of a bad taste in my mouth (literally, not figuratively). But for the most part, it's a decent root beer. Much better than Red Arrow, which is distributed by the same company.

My official review is that Bedford's gets 6 (six) IBCs. It's a good root beer. Not my first choice, but good. Really not much else to say about it, so... yeah. Lets just leave it at that.

O-So Butterscotch Root Beer

Well, summer is here in Phoenix, AZ and it's time to get our summer bodies in shape. I have been trying to exercise regularly and cut out sugar in an attempt to slim down so i don't embarrass myself when i go to the public pool. I find my biggest problem is that i have a seriously concerning sweet tooth. I love sweets; candies, ice cream, pies, cookies, soda, etc. All of them have been a non-stop for me basically since the holidays. There wasn't an eggnog i would say no to during that time, and now i have to pay the price for my gluttony by depriving myself of all of it to satisfy my vain ambition to be "decent looking" with my shirt off. It's really all i can hope for at this point. So for the past 2 weeks i have cut sugar out of my diet, and i've been quite good about it. Aside from a sip or two of Pepsi when my wife cracks a can or a small taste of her dessert after a meal, i have cut it out of my diet, and it SUCKS. I still have a crazy craving for sugar, and even with my best efforts to exercise and run at least 3 times a week i am just now starting to see the results of my efforts. It's kinda like driving in a car. You can't be going 60 mph and throw it into reverse and all of a sudden be going backward. You have to slow the speed of your car until you come to a stop and then you can start to go backward. So i'm working this stuff through my system and getting ready to go in reverse and start shedding some lbs. (Every nutritionist out there is calling me an idiot right now, and you know what? They are right.) All of this is to say i've been doing good with my diet but i am breaking it for the sake of this blog. That's how committed i am to getting the truth out there about root beers. Will it be worth it? Probably not.

I thought for sure i did this one before because it's one i've heard about several times in several places, but it appears i am just now getting to reviewing O-So Butterscotch Root Beer, bottled by Orca Beverage Bottling Co. We've seen Orca before as they bottle several other root beers i have tried, like Bedford's and Americana. The label states that O-So has been in production since 1946. I don't know much else about the history as this was likely an old company that either went out of business or sold off the recipe near the end to Orca to continue bottling the root beer. I feel like Orca specializes in finding older, often no longer in production sodas to give them a new life. This seems to be the kinds of root beers bottled by Orca to my knowledge and memory. And as i stated, this one seems like i should have done it already but i didn't see it in my archives so i've either just mistakenly not reviewed this or i got this root beer a long time ago and it's just been sitting in my fridge (both are highly likely scenarios). Since we are already talking about the label i will just go ahead and say the design on this one was phoned in. They did minimal work on this and it shows. Its a yellow... i guess clover shaped blob(?) with white writing in it. No extra points there. The name O-So lends to the statement on the bottom of the label which states that this stuff is "O-So Delicious!"

Well... i don't know if i would call it delicious, but it's pretty good. My main gripe is the same i have with any of the other butterscotch root beers i have had in the past. Too much butterscotch, not enough root beer. This stuff tastes much more like a butter beer than a root beer. This is made with pure cane sugar, which is prominent in the sweetness, and has hints of vanilla and carmel throughout. But the main overwhelming flavor is that of butterscotch. Luckily for me, i enjoy butterscotch quite a lot so this is a bit of a treat for me considering i've been off sugar. I almost don't want to say it but rather like this. My instincts tell me it should have more of a root beer flavor but i think what they have going on is working for them. Perhaps just change the name to butter beer and i won't make such a fuss about it. 

My official review is O-So Butterscotch Root Beer gets 7 (seven) IBCs. This is rated much higher than i should but it's a good drink. Again, i wouldn't call this a root beer but i would say it lives up to the O-So moniker. That's really the only reason it gets a 7, because it tastes very good and scratches that sweetness itch i've been having for the past 2 weeks. Ultimately this was not worth breaking my sugar abstinence for, but to be fair my kids helped me drink it so that i wouldn't overdose.