Root Beer - 223 Reviews

It was weird drinking this in my house because it felt out of place. This soda screams "Grandma's fridge" or "sketchy gas station/corner store in the middle of Pennsylvania". It looks generic and (surprise surprise) tastes generic. Editor Dan brought this back to us from his travels, and I'm very appreciative because now I know that this definitely is NOT "a treat" (sorry, I had to). I've had worse, but I could throw a bottle cap and find a better root beer than this.

High school life for Alex and Ryan was rough, especially after Ryan's girlfriend got kidnapped. Ryan told Cyndi time and time again not to mess with Slick, but she wouldn't listen. They knew they couldn't let him get away with it, so they grabbed some lead pipes and took to the streets of River City.

They came across a lot of nasty gangs along the way. The Generic Dudes were more annoying than troublesome. The Frat Guys were as dumb as they looked. But it was The Squids that really gave them trouble. Throwing wooden crates at them just wouldn't work, so they had to bust out their Acro Circus skills. That showed The Squids who was the boss.

After that, they really needed to relax with a sauna and a nice bottle of root beer. Unfortunately you couldn't find any root beer in River City if your life depended on it, but at least we now know what it would have tasted like. It's really sweet and smooth, with a slight bit and a whole lot of flavor to it. Not special flavor, just your classic root beer flavor. It's too bad they didn't have this because it would have definitely helped them.

Gilius Thunderhead was a strong dwarf who was an accomplished blacksmith. He became so strong became he was always wielding a hammer against an old fashioned anvil. He made swords, axes, railings, and everything in between. His favorite things to create were double-edged axes because he could get artistic and put all sorts of intricate filigree within the metal.

To unwind, he enjoyed drinking root beer. Sure, he's a short, tough guy, but he enjoys his sweets just like anyone. The company appreciated him buying case after case so much that they renamed their super-successful root beer to "Dwarven Draight" and Gilius was more than pleased. He liked the root beer because it was sweet, had a bit of complexity, and the taste stayed with you for a while.

The only group that he wouldn't share his root beer with was the Death Adders because they killed his brother and were generally quite mean and tactless. If you could hear the jokes they would make about minorities you wouldn't as much as share a stick of gum with them. Terrible, terrible people.

Pat went to a job interview at the old Fuhrman plant. He has always loved their pop as long as he can remember and when he saw that they were hiring so he decided he would try and get a job there. He put on a decent shirt and tie, clean pants, and some dress shoes that he never wears unless he's going to a wedding, job interview, or funeral.

When he was driving down the long parking lot to get to the main office, he noticed a truck backing up. He thought and assumed it would stop since he was driving in an empty parking lot and there was no reason why not to see him. Just as he thought that was going to be the case, it was too late to brake and the crazy truck driver wasn't stopping. Pat did what he could which involved nothing more than stepping to get to point A before the truck got to point B, otherwise someone was going to get clipped. Foot to the floor, Pat involuntarily yelled, as he knew it was going to be a close one but it was no luck. The truck skimmed the back of his car, scuffing some of the paint which was more than fixable but what wasn't fixable is that the otherwise good interview he was hoping for was going to be ruined now that some dumb trucker hit his car.

He went into the main office, upset, and asked to see the interviewer he had scheduled the interview with. The lady behind the counter said that the interviewer had left for the day and should have called him. Pat checked his phone only to find no messages or anything. The guy stiffed him. The lady saw that he was distraught so she gave him a bottle of root beer. He took it, thanked the lady and headed out the door. He took a sip and for the first time, he thought that the root beer was completely average. It didn't have any extraordinary flavors and it wasn't complex. It was just root beer. It was good, but today he needed something special and next to the crash and getting stood up, he needed something really special.

It wasn't Pat's best day so he went home to just veg out for a while and play video games. He would need them after a garbage day like this.

Franklin loves pancakes. He can't get enough of them. Some people have breakfast for dinner once and awhile as a treat, but Franklin has had pancakes for every meal for the past decade. You see his mother didn't approve of them. You see Franklin's father left her for the waitress who worked at the diner that would go to every week after church. Every week he would order a half-stack and silently flirt. One day he ordered a full-stack and once he polished them all off he announced that he was leaving the family, grabbed the waitress by the hand and disappeared into the summer sun. Franklin's mother never really recovered. To try and save face she blamed it all on the “devil's flapjacks” as she called them. From the time he was 7 until he left home at 18 Franklin never tasted another johnnycake. He would never let his mother know the truth, but as soon as he left home his obsession took hold and he ate battery goodness at every chance. He would drown them in maple syrup and just dig in. Sure he gained a lot of weight, but wasn't it worth it for that forbidden fruit?

Franklin eventually got a job at Tommyknocker soda brewery. He started as janitor, but slowly worked his way up to brewmaster general. It was then and only then that his genius was released on the world. Franklin put together a recipe that was sure to turn the soda world on its ear. He somehow successfully combined the nation's love of root beer with his own love of pancakes. Don't ask me how, I certainly don't know. He keeps his recipe locked tightly in the safe that is his mind. All I know is that the Tommyknocker root beer tastes like a nice vanilla and licorice heavy root beer that has been infused with liquefied pancakes that had drowned in a sea of syrup. It's strange. I'm not a fan of maple syrup myself, so I'm not a huge fan of this, but if you are this will leave you in a sticky sweet heaven.

This is one of those times that I REALLY wish a company had a working website. The website http://www.way2coolsodas.com is on the side of the bottle but it leads to nothing. I doubt this company is out of business because I found this bottle at a Whole Foods in Santa Fe, NM a few months ago. Since I have no way of contacting anyone from this company, I am going to conduct a fictional interview with their owner.

Who are you?
I'm Lloyd, I live in Santa Fe, NM and I founded Way 2 Cool Sodas.

Why did you name it "Way 2 Cool"
I was sitting in my dorm room one day and I was thinking about how awesome it would be if I made my own soda. I thought to myself that if I actually did it, it would be way too cool. So since I couldn't think of anything more radical than that, it stuck.

Do you realize that "Way 2 Cool" is possible the worst beverage name I have ever seen? Even Kronik is better than that.
No way dude! You just don't get it.

And look at the artwork on the bottle! It looks like someone on an acid trip painted it.
I painted that and I do not admit that I did an eighth of shrooms and smoked a bowl before painting it.

The only way the horrible name and art would be redeemable would be if this root beer was exceptional, but it's not. It's pretty generic tasting root beer. I wouldn't be surprised if you took Safeway brand root beer, poured it into these glass bottles, and called it "micro brewed"
That's like, your opinion man.

There you have it. How this got on the shelves of Whole Foods, I will never know.

I found this on tour and was pretty excited to find it. Caffeine in root beer is a very rare thing. Of the 130+ root beers we have reviewed so far, only three have contained caffeine (Skeleteens Jack Black's Dead Red Root Beer, Barq's, and Bawl's G33K Beer). This bottle I have in my hand brings us to number 4. With all the added energy ingredients in this, I was fearing that it would taste more like a gross energy drink with artificial root beer flavor sprinkled in. To my surprise, it was actually really good! It has a very classic root beer taste, with a medium bite to it. If I had not seen the label, I would have never known this was also an energy drink.

I see that Eric's Famous also makes a cola. Hopefully we'll be able to find that one soon, and hopefully it's as good as this.

When I saw the Cooper's Cave sodas in the store I bought every flavor they had. They are a quasi-local company (about 4 hours away) and the labels looked great. Seriously, look at the design on any one of their flavors. They all have a cool comic book look to them. Remember what your mother said; “Don't judge a book by its cover.” This is one of those times when that nugget of wisdom works in the opposite way of what she meant. I guess “All that glitters is not gold” is another way of putting it.

This is one bland birch beer. An average amount of birch beer flavor hits you as soon as you take a swig, and just as quick it's gone. It tricks you in much the same way that diet pop does. You're greeted with a nice flavor that quickly dissipates, but instead of the gross sting of sucralose you're left with nothing. It's strange, it's sad and it leaves me wanting more flavor.

Death Valley gets a bad wrap. Whomever named it should go back to marketing school, assuming they didn't graduate, and try again because they forever blackened the name of that place. Look, sure, things happened, it's hot, it doesn't have a quenching water park, and there isn't a nice suburb filled with crap like Applebee's, TGI Friday's, and Joe's Crab Shack for families to go to on the weekend. I am no city planner but I can tell you that you don't need those things to make things happen. I do know you can't have a place called "Death Valley" and have it give off the "fun" vibe.

Here is a start. Everyone that crosses the border from outside to inside Death Valley gets a complimentary bottle of their root beer. This root beer has a fantastic, real vanilla taste that is with you on every sip and a nice, dark flavor throughout. Dark like Death Valley at night but cool, unlike Death Valley, like...ever.

This might have to be limited to one bottle per car as we are trying to fix the image of Death Valley, not bankrupt them. Limit one per car, please share. Don't forget to stop at the Death Valley memorial on your way in and out for great prices on sweatshirts you would have to be crazy to wear anywhere within 250 miles of Death Valley.

Once again I have been derailed by the taste of a drink. I was planning on writing a big long story about a dog, named Sparky, on a boat and all the adventures she has had. But then I took my first sip of this and was blown away by the taste.

This may be the most complex root beer I have ever tasted. Given the tagline "old style", I was expecting this to be a middle of the road classic tasting root beer like Dad's or IBC. Instead, what I got was a wave of delicious and interesting flavors. At the base level, it's a nice hearty root beer with a medium bite. But once you sit back and take in all the other flavors, it's incredible.

The ingredients include wintergreen oil, anise, and vanilla which are all strongly present in the taste. Each sip tastes different, which is awesome. Sometimes you get a strong licorice aftertaste, and other times it's a smooth vanilla flavor followed by a minty tingle on your lips.

Congratulations Sea Dog, you have made my top 5 root beers of all time.

Hey Fred, can you pour me a root beer? You might want to put down that licorice first or else you might... drop it in the glass like you just did. No, it's ok. Luckily I like licorice, so this should be interesting. Wow, that gave it a really strong licorice/anise taste! I love it. It has a good bite too. You might be on to something with this Fred, what a happy accident.

This delicious soda has a sordid past with Franklin Mercer. As you all know, he grew up in rural Pennsylvania and this soda was in every store. At a very young age, before he even had his first sip, Franklin knew he loved soda. From ages 3-7 he would bug his parents every time they were at the corner store for a bottle of it. Like clockwork, they said not until he turned 10. This made no sense to Franklin because his older brother had been drinking root beer since the age of 4. Those Mercers were always hard to understand.

This all took a turn for the worst one day when he was visiting his grandparents in Kingston, PA. While they were taking their usual afternoon nap, he ventured into the kitchen for a snack. He couldn't believe his eyes when he found a bottle of this Reading Draft Creamy Red Birch Beer in the fridge. Without hesitation, he cracked it open and took his first sip of liquid heaven. He promptly drank the whole bottle and hid the evidence behind some newspapers on the counter. He didn't hide it good enough because his father found it an hour later when he came and picked it up.

As you can guess, Mr. Mercer was furious! He thought long and hard about what Franklin's punishment should be and he came up with the meanest thing he could think of. As long as Franklin still lived with his parents (which ended up being around 23 more years), an unopened bottle of this soda would be permanently affixed to his bedroom dresser. That bottle just sat there everyday, taunting Franklin. You'd think this would have turned him off from soda, but it actually increased his appetite for the sugary drink.

Franklin never had another bottle of this creamy red birch beer, which is a shame, because it's really good. I'm more partial to birch beers with a good bite to them, but this tastes like a mix of birch beer and red cream soda.

Today we announced that the winning name for our "name our mascot" contest was "Sir Durstig." The fine folks over at The Rootbeer Brothers came up with the name and we salute them for it. Their response was for us to grab our finest root beer and drink it in celebration. I tried, but what I grabbed certainly wasn't my best root beer, but it was the only one that I had that was already cold.

When I took my first sip I was nicely surprised at how dark and full-bodied it tasted. I was even more shocked when I looked at the ingredients and saw that it was sweetened with HFCS. Then I noticed that it has molasses in it and I understood and smiled. I want molasses in more root beers. The more I drank the less impressed I was. The molasses flavored remained with every sip, but the complexity of the root beer quality of it faltered. It seemed to get weaker and weaker with every sip, until I only had about a fifth of the bottle left. At that point it got stronger, but still not to the level that I wanted it to be.

This had the potential to be one incredible root beer, but when root beer extract is one of the ingredients I guess I shouldn't have expected much. This certainly wouldn't satisfy a tiny bear cub, let alone a full grown big bear.

I was planning on posting the lyrics to the They Might Be Giants song "The Cap'm" and changing some words so that it praised this root beer. Then I actually drank it, and even though I still wanted to I decided I couldn't lie to our dear readers.

This is one of the worst root beers I have ever tasted. It's very dark and creamy tasting. Normally I would associate both of those things with a good root beer, but someone the cap'm got it all wrong. It's actually a brewed soda, so I'm wondering if something was wrong with the batch I tried. I did a quick Google search and the reviews I found of it were all glowing. Some people even claim it to be one of their favorites. The three people I shared it with and myself couldn't disagree more. The fact that it got worst with each sip really makes me think it was a bad batch. Each sip tasted different and weird in a different way. By the bottom of the bottle the wintergreen oil was so prevalent that it almost tasted like a mint root beer. I normally love complex root beers, but this is all wrong. That's it I need to try another bottle of this.

I'm slowly beginning to really enjoy sodas that have honey in them. The first one I ever had was Thomas Kemper and I didn't like it at first. Over time, it grew on me. This is another example of a decent root beer with honey in it. It has a nice classic root beer taste with not a whole lot of bite. But then the honey kicks in and it's a smooth and sweet aftertaste. I'd classify this as "good, but not great". Sorry Dominion, I love the label art though. The deer is very noble.

In order to cut my chocolate intake a bit, I decided on a root beer float. I undoubtedly made the right decision. This pop was spectacular. I don't know where the "float" came from, but the root beer was pretty great. If I had to stretch it, I might saw that the root beer was smoother than normal. If they called it "root beer" I would have been satisfied. "Float" doesn't take away from the drink, it just builds up some expectations. The root beer was that good that I don't care if they called it "crap soup". Go ahead. I dare you. Put out a root beer called "crap soup" and dare me not to drink it.

This is Harry Potter. No, I did not cast a spell on him and turn him into a bottle of root beer. This is the soda that lived. Allow me to start my story from the beginning.

I was just on tour with my friends' band and we stopped at Galco's Soda Pop Stop in Los Angeles, CA. I had wanted to go there for quite some time so I was very excited to be there. I hand picked a lot of sodas we hadn't reviewed and safely put them in a box in the van. I didn't have as much time on the road to review them as I thought I would, so my plan was to bring them all back to Buffalo. They were traveling great, until we got to Saskatoon.

Saskatoon is a small city in the province of Saskatchewan in the middle of Canada. When we got there, it was zero degrees outside (around -18 Celsius) in early December. The locals told us this was mild for that time of year. Immediately, Saskatoon became a place I will never visit again in the winter. We played the show, and then went to a friend's house to sleep. No one told us of the dangers of leaving a dozen glass soda bottles in the van overnight.

The next morning, we found all of my sodas frozen and the bottles shattered. Obviously, I was really bummed. We drove to a gas station to sadly throw them out. As we were doing so, we found one that wasn't frozen: this bottle of Bedford's Root Beer. I don't know what prevented it from freezing, but I was happy to see at least one survived.

I was expecting it to taste like the best root beer ever. I figured any drink that can withstand those extreme temperatures must be magical. Sadly, it wasn't that awesome. It was a good middle of the road root beer. But if you want a root beer that can withstand freezing temperatures, this is the one.

I've never hated A&W. I mean, it's root beer. It's really hard to hate root beer. Who also doesn't love aged vanilla? I actually don't know the taste difference between new, crisp vanilla and old, moldy vanilla. I do know that this is a smooth, lil' can of root beer that I would drink again. I enjoy these short stack cans and I enjoy slamming one without thinking twice about a calorie count.

This tastes like a slightly dark root beer and you can taste the vanilla. I don't know where Dan got this, but now that I've drank it, I'll probably see it everywhere like when you buy a car no one else owns and then, all of a sudden, everyone has one.

Editor Dan saw this and bought it for us. I was lucky enough to have won it in the raffle when we all got together. I am happy I won. I am happy that it was good. A&W should be happy that they did so well in this review. I have nothing bad to say about it. Real sugar would have gotten you a five in my book.

Wh...Where am I? Why am I wearing this suit? Why does this suit have shoulder pads?

I sentence you...

Hold on a minute. Aren't you Judge Wapner?

That's right son, the one and only.

Holy crap! Am I on The Peoples' Court?

Yes, I have brought you back to 1984 to punish you for your wrongdoings. I would also have to ask you to watch your mouth on national television.

I'm sorry. Wait...wrongdoings? What did I do?

It says here that you are from West Virginia. Is that correct?

Yes it is, your honor.

It also says that in 1975, you put a Pembroke Welsh Corgi in a baby carriage. Is that correct?

Wait...what? 1975? That was thirty-six years ago. I have no idea. I would have been like six years old.

It's a simple question, sir. Did you, regardless of year, place a dog in a carriage? Yes or no?

I suppose, when I was a child, I may have, at one point in time, put a dog in a baby carriage, yes.

Well sir, in the state of West Virginia, you may only place a baby in a baby carriage and nothing else. Since you have admitted guilt, I will go easy on you. As I was saying when you woke up from time travel, I sentence you to drink my root beer!

Oh, come on! That's not...wait...drink root beer?

That's right. Drinking my root beer is your harsh punishment for such a heinous crime.

Oh, well. I suppose I could do that. Can I go back to my house in 2011 once I'm done with this bottle of root beer?

Yes, I have the lever right here that will send you home. All you have to do is drink this entire bottle of root beer.

Fair enough. Here goes. It's not that bad, Judge. It's herby, kind of a medium-dark root beer. It tastes home brewed. Did you brew this yourself?

Yes, son. I did. Do you like it?

I do, actually. Can I get this in 2011? If so, I might just periodically pick one up.

Son, you have earned a parole. I will cut your sentence in half. You only need to drink half that bottle and then you can go home.

Oh, awesome. Well you can pull that lever. I'm already over half way done. If you don't mind, I'd like to finish this when I wake up from my time travel slumber.

That's fine. Stand on that box and I will send you back. As soon as I bang this gavel, and simultaneously pull this switch, you will be sent back to your time. Thank you for spending time with us, doing your time like a responsible adult, and enjoying my root beer.

You're welcome, Judge. It's been a pleasure. Thank you.

This root beer has one of my favorite labels ever. It's simple and classic looking. I would expect it to be the design on a wine bottle, and as we all know wine labels are generally the coolest looking of all drinks (even though they smell like literal death). That little guy is so excited to crack open his root beer. Perhaps there was an amendment to the constitution or some such thing and they are have a little celebratory party. Sure they have plenty of alcohol, but Chowning has had this special bottle of root beer put away, and he's been dying to bust it out. Seriously imagine how strong a root beer would have to be back then, especially one that is stopped with a cork (I'm sure all root beer was cork stopped back then).

The label also talks about boiling down roots and other ingredients to make a quality root beer. Mike and I tried making root beer like that once. We boiled it all down and it tasted pretty fantastic. Something went wrong in the carbonation though and an army of yeast soldiers invaded my mouth and I realized our wonderful brew was ruined. I'm guessing Old Dominion didn't really boil this down, as two of the ingredients are "root beer extract #214" and "root beer extract #79-400." I don't know what those numbers mean, but I'd love to find out. There is yucca, and vanilla in here though as well as honey for a sweetener (something that will always get a thumbs up from me). The blend tastes somewhere in the middle of a decent "root beer syrup" and a quality brewed from scratch soda. The first couple of sips were a bit disappointing, but the closer I got to the bottom of the bottle the stronger it became. I guess there was some settling of the ingredients.

While this may not 100% be an old boiled/brewed root beer from colonial times, it still beats most other brands that are commonly found. I'm sure everyone at the party enjoyed it quite a lot, while Chowning silently sulked, for he knew the greatness that it came so close to being.