Cane Sugar - 601 Reviews

What accompanies Boyz 'N The Hood more than pizza and Very Cherry Jelly Belly pop? Ummm, nothing? Yep-ahhh. Good ol' Larry Fishburn as the lovable Furious Styles accompanying me on a voyage through childhood in South Central LA while I accompany him with some cherry flavored pop. What a team? I can picture it now...Ice Cube, Cuba, and I sitting around the domino table with some bones and a cold 4 pack (they don't come in 6 packs) of Jelly Belly Very Cherry pop. Throwing bones. Dominoes!

Initially, the taste was sweet and cherry-esque, but it quickly and powerfully, much like the power of a strong black woman like Angela Basset, tasted just like cherry Jelly Belly candies. You know how I usually get mad when something tastes like candy, but with Jelly Belly pop, I might be upset if it didn't.

This was pretty good and the perfect accoutrement to classic cinema and garbage pizza.

Thomas Kemper really likes to put honey in their sodas apparently. I woke up with a sore throat today and bought this at a cafe in hopes it had real ginger in it. Sadly, it does not. As far as ginger ale's go, this is very mild. The honey gives it a nice sweet after taste. If you're looking for a decent alternative to ginger ale with HFCS, then this is a good stop. As for me, I'm still looking.

Ugh. You know what? Here's what you can do...

Go to the store and buy some chocolate pudding and a bottle of pop. Then, go over to your local shopping mall, go into the bathroom, take out your pudding cup and make a mess on the floor with it. Make an anonymous call to the mall service desk letting them know that the bathroom is in disrepair and they should clean it immediately. Wait in the fake shrubs and bushes for the cleaning staff to arrive and drink your pop. You'll need the bottle. When they arrive and go into the bathroom, take a slew of their cleaning supplies and pour them into the now empty pop bottle. Make sure to get things like lemon Pledge and any sort of citrus scented disinfectant. Carbonate it with magic or something. Go to the food court, get some low quality Chinese food and prepare to wash it down with your new concoction.

Honestly, this stuff from smell to taste was bathroom-esque. It was bitter, but I don't mind bitter. It was the smell of the stuff that was a turn off from the very beginning. The taste just sealed the deal. It might be a mixer, but if it is, label it as so because it was sold as a cocktail soda and I drank it as such.

Hey friend, want to take a quiz? Yeah? Great. Question; What flavor is 7-Up? Lemon and lime? Alright. What flavor is Sprite? Lemon and lime? Ok. Well what flavor is Sierra Mist? Lemon and lime with maybe some other citrus? Alright? Drink this Tommy's Naked Soda. I know it's a funny name. What do you think that it tastes like? Lemon and lime? Friend, you certainly have a limited amount of answers to my questions. If this tastes like lemon and lime, what do you think that 7-Up, Sprite, and Sierra Mist taste like? Oh, not lemon and lime all of a sudden? Strange. So what you're telling me is that Tommy's actually tastes like the advertised fruit and the others don't really taste like anything but a cacophony of citrus? Yes? Alright. Thanks for taking my quiz. Oh, what? You want to keep the bottle of Tommy's? You can't keep it. You can have another sip, but I kind of wanted it. You think you deserve it because I made you take a stupid quiz. Alright, I'll take one more sip and give it to....[tires squealing]

This is another local soda from Portland, OR. I had tried this when I first moved here but Thirsty Dudes was just an idea in my head at that point. Maybe it's because I'm drinking this on an empty stomach, but this is one of the heaviest root beer's I've ever drank. It has a really rich flavor. There is a hint of a honey aftertaste (one of the ingredients), but besides that it's a fairly run of the mill root beer.

As you may well know, the Thirsty Dudes are scientists. We are obligated by the scientific community to conduct experiments constantly. We barely have time to drink all of these beverages for you our loyal readers. This review is one such experiment.
Clear root beer is a strange, strange thing. You crack it open and the smell is there; the scent of a decent root beer. Tasting it is a different story. It tastes like the lightest root beer ever. My hypothesis was correct that the fact that it's clear really messed with my taste buds. I really believe that if it were brown it would taste more like root beer to me. So, so strange.

I'm not going to lie. I almost didn't drink this. When I opened it I took a whiff of the not at all appealing fluid contained in the bottle. My friend Dan said "It smells like a girl who chewed strawberry gum, who had terrible breath." For the sake of you, our loyal readers, I followed through and introduced bottle to lips. It didn't taste as terrible as it's odor. It was also not very good. Like the other Abbot Farms' sodas I've had, it tasted like a cheap liquefied candy. Not even like those candies wrapped in foil made to look like strawberries that your great aunt Millie keeps in her winter coat, an even cheaper candy than that.
While I do appreciate the attempt you have made Abbot Farms, please stick to cider in your future ventures.

Adventure number two in the return to the world of Skeleteens didn't go as amazingly as number one. The Black Lemonade is still pretty rad, but it's not something that I'm going to crave.
On first sip, I was in love. This is really strong bitter slightly carbonated lemonade. The problem is it's a bit too strong. About 1/3 of the way through the 12oz bottle I could already tell I was starting to get a stomachache. I took about an hour break, and now I'm back into it.
Now that I'm at it again, it now tastes like carbonated lemonade that had some candy dissolved into it. You know how cola tastes when you drink it through a licorice straw? It's a similar effect as that, but with a different candy.
This also has all the crazy herbal ingredients in it, so I'm sure I'll have an energy freak out shortly.
Oh and they weren't kidding. This stuff is black. Hold it up to a light and it is just darkness, it doesn't have a red or blue tint at all.

You know what can be enjoyable? Going to the moving pictures theatre. You know what is never enjoyable? Paying exorbitant amounts of money for the syrupy trash they pass off as drinks in said establishments. Am I a scumbag because I bring my own beverages to the theatre? If you say yes, then I demand you talk to the establishments and get them to start carrying some decent drinks.
Today I went and saw True Grit. I thought it was rad, but that is neither here nor there in the world of beverage reviews. About halfway through what I will call the second act, I busted out this tea. I had bought it in NJ on a recent trip. I thought it was something I had drank a while back, and as soon as it hit my lips, I knew I was correct. Ah yes the day we got back from touring the UK to discover that our van had close to zero stopping power in the brakes world. We waited all day for a garage to fix it (which they never did) and I drank iced tea from a close by grocery store. You like how my thoughts on a movie play no part in a review, but my tales of vehicular woes do? Well I was pissed off, and this tea brought me a little enjoyment in the middle of a very annoying situation. It's pretty outstanding in the world of overly sweet fruit teas, which I do love on occasion. It actually tastes like raspberries, and not just fruity sugary sweetness. That I can get into.
Oh and when I was on my most recent trip to Jersey, I noticed that the previously mentioned garage had gone out of business. Serves them right.

This is easily the most flavorful cherry soda I've ever had. It tastes like someone carbonated a bottle of grenadine and added some sugar. It's not as heavy tasting as you might think, but unless you LOVE cherry flavor this might be too much for you. My mouth is going to taste like cherry all day now.

I got a text message from a friend late the other night telling me to go out to my front yard because she had thrown a growler onto my snow covered front lawn of this delicious soda for me. I quickly ran out in my pjs and grabbed it up from its snowy tomb.
Flying Bison is a local brewery that will occasionally make some soda. I had heard they were making this, but when I went to get some, it wasn't ready yet. I was definitely pumped to be able to try it. It wasn't as strong as I was expecting it to be. That is definitely a good thing. Anything that is too strongly mint flavored is generally terrible. This tastes like they got a decent nondescript flavored soda going on in a large vat and then dissolved a couple of hundred candy canes on it. While it's in your mouth there is only a slight mint flavor to it. It's when you swallow and breath in that the mintiness really hits you. You also get a nice minty taste when you lick your lips afterward.
I couldn't drink a huge glass of this, but a nice small glass of it is a really nice accent to the season.

Well my mom took one sip of this and said "Well that's gross." She also lives on water and diet store brand pop, so she's not much of an authority.
My review is that it tastes like a fairly decent cola. I think it's way better than a Pepsi or Coke, but not as tasty as some gourmet colas I've had.
The name may make you think that there is weed in this, since it's also a relaxing soda. Fear not, no illegal drugs are used in the making of this soda. I guess I can't vouch for the sobriety of the workers who make it. It does have passionflower and kava in it, which can help one to relax. It won't knock you out like other relaxations do.

I had high expectations for this cream soda. I'd be lying if I said this didn't have to do with the drawing of a bridge on the bottle. Why do I think good packaging equals a tasty beverage? I have no clue.

Sadly, this isn't as good as I thought it would be. It has a nice vanilla flavor, but the after taste is pretty bland. While not the worst cream soda, definitely not something I'd go out of my way to buy again.

The peach flavor in this is overpoweringly strong. It's so strong that you can't taste the yerba mate at all. It barely tastes like tea at all. It's just a sugary peach drink. I really want more tea flavor out of this, and I would really enjoy it. Oh well, I guess I shouldn't have expected much from a product whose label looks like part of the Ed Hardy line.

Hank's just knows how to make solid quality sodas. There's really nothing out of the ordinary with the birch beer. It just tastes like Hank's spent the extra money and bought really high quality ingredients, instead of picking them up at Aldi or the Dollar Tree.
There is "fair birch beer" for kids and there is birch beer like this for adults. This is one time I'm going to accept that I'm an adult.

I don't know what makes a gourmet root beer "gourmet". Is it that they add extra "stuff" to the mix and, in return, can call it "gourmet"? That's all they do with pizza. Maybe they put better ingredients in and get to call it that. Aside from whatever quillaia and yucca extracts, this root beer is pretty standard when it comes to ingredients. There is a pretty definite vanilla taste to round out the root beer taste, which is actually pretty nice.

I also found that I burped a lot with this drink. Good, heavy root beer burps. The kind of burps that you get yelled at by your mom when you burp in your room with you door closed and she's downstairs. You know burping is "rude," but come on mom it's my room. If I can't burp there, where can I burp? That's what I want to know and now!

This root beer is good, and I appreciate the recommendation. We appreciate the recommendation. It's not terribly different from a lot of other root beers, but it's not bad by any means and you can tell that it's not a mass produced, garbage root beer.

Another great soda from the Hanks company. A high quality creamsicle flavored beverage. My friend Kevyn hates creamsicles. Show of hands, how many people feel sorry for him? Not only does he not enjoy an amazing summer treat, but he also won't give this great soda a chance. It's a shame I tell you.

Mike had their dry cola, and he wasn't really into it at all. Understandably I was hesitant to pick this up, but I thought what the heck and here we are now.
This is the kind of soda that would be nice to drink with a meal. It's nothing too fancy. No not like hutdogs and handburgers, but a sit down meal. I would probably drink it with some tofu, rice and vegetables. Of course that is a staple in my diet, so I drink a lot of things with that.
It's a dry soda. The flavor doesn't leave much of an aftertaste, which is nice. Mike also hates black currants. I love them. We had a bush in my backyard when I was growing up. Actually that's a lie. They were red currants. Either way, I loved the tartness of them. Mixed with the grapes, it reminds me of a high end sparkling grape juice. You know the ones that would be like $5 a bottle. Oh so expensive.

"Woah!" That's what happened first. I said "woah". Why, you ask? Because when was the last time you tasted cinnamon in your root beer? Me? Never.

This is a gourmet root beer made by a gourmet chef. I don't care if I'm giving her more credit than she has on her business card because an element of invention and originality went into this drink. This root beer has a light, but crisp root beer taste and then, like a ton of bricks, cinnamon-town. It tastes like real cinnamon, too.

Do you know what the cinnamon challenge is? It's an awful but hilarious game to play with unsuspecting kids where you fill a cap of cinnamon with cinnamon and dare them to take down the whole thing. It's like eating sand and I've watched people puke, but they were drunk and stupid so it was either puke from the cinnamon challenge or puke from a gallon of swill beer. There is not this much cinnamon in the drink, but it tastes like real cinnamon and not whatever a fake cinnamon, or candy cinnamon would taste like.

There is also ginger which I think you get at the tail end that kind of cleanses your palate and a vanilla that gives it an earthy tone. It's good. It really takes you for a loop because it touches all bases. It would be a good dessert since it's got so much "sweet" going on. Not because of the sugar, but because of everything else. It kind of reminds me of if you ate an apple pie and there were no apples in it...but in a good way. I've already recommended that my brother in Ames, Iowa buy some next time he's at the bar.

I'll tell you what's delicious. Tacos, most pizza, Hanks black cherry pop, and chipotle flavored Tabasco sauce. See how I subtly slid Hanks in there? Well it shouldn't have been that subtle because it's frigging wonderful.

For the first time in a long time I can taste non-candied black cherry flavor. Do you live in Philly? Does cheese flow through your veins? Can you go a week without at least wanting to go to Gino's? Then number 1 you should equally be in love with Hanks and if number 2 if you haven't had it hop to it.

Flavor. It's very clean. No aftertaste of leftover sugar. Just plain good.