Pop Shoppe Root Beer

Where is the classic bottle? I feel cheated that I am drinking a Pop Shoppe soda that is not in a “stubbie” bottle. Look at our other reviews if you don't know what I'm talking about. Growing up 10 minutes from Canada, Pop Shoppe played a role in my childhood and their iconic bottles were a big part of it. Actually it was more likely College Club from Rochester, NY just using their bottles after Pop Shoppe closed down in '83, but my memories are the same. My friends and I would walk down to the store, pay our quarter each and grab a bottle from the cooler. Inevitably one of us would not open the bottle with the opener at the store, and forget that it didn't have a twist off cap, so far too much time would be devoted to trying to get the bottle open on a curb or something. We were kids, we were dumb…€¦.wait I opened a bottle on a curb just last week. Okay, so I may be an adult now, but I'm still dumb apparently. My point is those bottles were a big part of the Pop Shoppe charm. Their sodas generally fall on the better side of average (read: store brand), but the fact that they come in glass bottles makes them seem more legit.

I'll try to put my bottle envy in check to review this. Flat out, it's a strange root beer. It has a slight medicinal taste to it, and it makes me think that someone mixed a bottle of root beer with a bottle of Moxie. It makes me feel like it would be the kind of root beer that would be sold from the back of wagons in the old west. I don't really think that happened, but in my dreams it did, and you have no jurisdiction over my dreams. It also has a fairly strong wintergreen flavoring to it. Somehow after all of that it is still creamy. I don't hate it. In fact I find it fairly interesting. If all root beers tasted the same this planet would be an even more boring place to live.