(to the tune of Volare) Root... Beer Float, oh, oh, oh, oh; let's fly,

Back in May, my grandma and I decided to do our trip down to Escondido so she can look at clothes at this place called Drapers and Damons, but before we stop at D and D, we stopped at Old Town Root Beer Company, Temecula, to, want to guess....I'll wait.........Sorry, time is up, I am an impatient person, and you're taking too long, to get more root beer. So I purchased some more root beer and a ginger beer. I don't know who is at fault here, but I came home with a ginger beer, that I tried, but decided it was too strong for me, so I poured the rest down the drain, remembering next time to be more careful. So, I came home with five root beers. The first root beer that I drank was called Tommyknocker Original Root Beer and on the label is a miner. But inside the bottle is the taste of a waffle. Seriously, the root beer is made with Tahitian Vanilla Extract and Pure Maple Syrup and you can taste those ingredients in many sips or gulps as you want to take. Very, very, very, good, I'll have to have one with my eggs and potatoes and toast.

On a side note, the owner jokingly offered me a position because I was quite knowledgeable and I was able to share my experiences about the beverages that I consumed. I took him up on the offer, but I live too far away, for the job to be worth it, but it would have been a fun position.

Back to the root beer situation....hmmmmm...oh yes, try Tommyknocker Root Beer, it tastes like breakfast.....Continuing on, the next root beer I tried was Barrel Brothers Root Beer, Creamy Vanilla, but yet vanilla isn't listed in the ingredients, but quillaia extract, along with HF Corn Sweetener; is this similar to the corn syrup? A very good root beer and a very unique label.

Lion Brewery, Brewery Made, Root Beer, Draught Style; a good root beer and it contains quillaia extract, yucca extract and acacia in addition to HF Corn Syrup, carbonated water and caramel color.

Polar Classics Premium Root Beer; a good root beer that contains quillaia extract and citric acid, in addition to the basic formula of carbonated water, cane sugar (or HF Corn Syrup), Natural and Artificial Flavors, caramel color and sodium benzoate.

Lastly is Olde Brooklyn Root Beer, born in Brooklyn, NY and brewed in Williamsburg. Basic root beer ingredients except the water is triple filtered carbonated water ( I guess New Yorkers don't care for their water either :)) and it contains pure cane sugar in addition to the ingredients mentioned in the paragraph above. For more info on Olde Brooklyn go to http://whiterockbeverages.com/OldeBrooklyn.cfm
For the other root beers go to http://www.polarbev.com for Polar Classics Premium Root Beer, http://lionbrewery.com/home/brewery/our-products/soda/lion-brewery/root-beer/ for Lion Brewery Root Beer,  http://tommyknocker.com/SODA.html for Tommyknocker Root Beer, and http://www.applebeer.com/ for the Barrel Brothers Root Beer or actually since there's no info on the website on the root beer, read about their apple beer.

It's a marshmallow world, sorry, a root beer float

For my birthday, my dad presented me with a 24 pack of various root beers; it was a great selection and some of the root beers, I have tried before or haven't tried in a while, like a bottled Dad's Root Beer, a Bucking Root Beer, Virgil's Root Beer, and Bulldog Root Beer. If you want information on Dad's Root Beer, go to www.dadsrootbeer.com.

I have tried some of the root beers and some of the root beers were just okay; basic formula and nothing new or different like, wintergreen, cinnamon, quillaia or yucca extract. Some of these root beers were Saranac Root Beer (made with HF Corn Syrup; there is a difference in taste between HF Corn Syrup and Cane Sugar),  Dr Brown's Original Root Beer (contains High Fructose Corn Syrup and Gum Acacia) and Americana, which in previous blogs, I said bad things about this root beer, probably because it was up against other root beers that were slightly superior but I am hear to say that this root beer contains pure organic honey, and extracts of licorice and sassafras root bark; now that makes for a good root beer. For information on Saranac and Dr Brown's Original go to http://www.saranac.com/page/root-beer (and they also brew beer) and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Brown's and http://jandrbottling.com.


So I continued to drink the root beers given to me from my dad for my birthday and here are the final thoughts:

Red Arrow Root Beer; contains extract of wintergreen and licorice in addition to basic root beer formula; very good and when I went to visit Old Town Root Beer Company, about a month ago, I was told that this one was supposed to very spicy, but that brings me to my next root beer; Sparky's Fresh Draft Root Beer, now this one is one spicy roota beer; as opposed to a spicy me tall ball ("meatball"). It doesn't explain in detail what spices are in this one, but one sip, or two sips, or maybe 4 sips, you can taste the spice. Sparky's also contains honey and imitation flavorings, as opposed to artificial flavorings. I'd get Sparky's again because it was original, unique and different.

Another root beer that I got was Squamscot old fashioned Beverages, a root beer brewed in New Hampshire. This root beer contained citric acid and clove oil; interesting ingredients made for a very good root beer.

Boylan Bottling Co. Cane Sugar Root Beer, a root beer bottle in New Jersey and it contains Yucca Extract, very tasty root beer.

Lastly on this root beer adventure, that took me 4 months, the last root beer was Dog n Suds Drive In Style Root Beer, a very good, basic root beer; appears to go good with hot dogs (Based off the design on the label).

For more information on these final root beers go to http://www.orcabeverage.com/storefront/index.php for Red Arrow, http://www.dognsudsbrand.com/ for Dog n Suds, http://www.boylanbottling.com/products/cane-sugar-sodas/boylan-root-beer/, for the Boylan Bottling Co Root Beer; btw the description for the root beer on their website is kind of annoying because I tasted none of that. I guess I'll have to try this root beer again. http://www.sparkysrootbeer.com/, for Sparky's Root Beer, and http://www.nhsoda.com/Home.asp, for Squamscot Root Beer

To The Land of Beers (made originally made with root (s))

Went back to Old Town Root Beer Company Temecula, in Old Town Temecula and bought some more root beer. Bought 9 bottles, but only keeping four because the rest are going to my cousin. 2 out of the 5 bottles, I have tried, but the others, I'll have to try later. They are Olde PA Old Fashioned Root Beer, Buckin' Root Beer by Jackson Hole Soda, Gray's Brewing Co Gourmet Root Beer and River City Root Beer.

I finished the aforementioned and I'll say that they were an interesting selection...Olde PA was good and it came in a clear bottle; good thing it was a soda and not a beer, because apparently light kills beer.   In addition to the basic formula of water, sugar, caramel, Natural and Artificial flavors, it also contained citric acid, gum acacia, quillaia and Yucca extracts. Gave it an interesting flavor. At the moment, I have no idea what quillaia is and I'd have to look it up later. www.oldephillysoda.com if you want more information on Olde PA.

Buckin' Root Beer by Jackson Hole Soda, is a delicious root beer and in addition to the basic formula found in most root beers, like the one mentioned above, Buckin Root Beer has gum acacia, like the Olde PA, mentioned above...Hmmmm. it sounds like this root beer is similar to the one above except it doesn't have the extract of quillaia (the milled inner bark or stems and small branches of the soap bark; known to be used as vet vaccines as an adjuvant(helps to enhance the patient's immunity response to the antigen)...IF you want more information on this root beer go to...www.jacksonholesoda.com.

Gray's Brewing Company, Gourmet Root Beer, contains cane sugar and the basic formula mentioned previously.  I'm going to digress a little bit and say that I have found out through my days of drinking this root beer, that there is a significant difference between drinking root beer with cane sugar and high fructose corn syrup, the cane sugar root beer tastes dramatically better and I am starting to prefer cane sugar root beer, but A&W is still the best commercial root beer, followed by MUG, Barq's, Dad's, Hires, Hansen's....So...if you want more info on the Gray's Root Beer go to,www.graybrewing.com and click on Gray's Soda and they also make real beer.

River City Root Beer contains quillaia extract and was a really good root beer. It seems that the root beers that I talk about after Olde PA, they are beginning to be written as a pyramid blog because each individual root beer contains one ingredient from the first root beer; that is interesting.....

So I went back to Old Town Root Beer Company, Temecula, in early May and I bought five more root beers and actually a ginger beer, but I don't know whose fault that was, I thought I bought six root beers. This discussion will be discussed in the next one. For more information on River City Root Beer, go to www.bluedogbeverages.com

The Root Beer Adventure continues again...

So I sampled some more root beer, compliments of my dad, and here's what I thought:
Filbert's Old Time Quality Draft Root Beer, pretty basic and pretty good. It was made with corn sweetner and distributed by Filbert Root Beer Co, Chicago IL. For more info, click on this link, http://www.glassbottlesoda.org/bottlers/filberts.shtml or go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filbert%27s_Old_Time_Root_Beer.

(Piratey voice) This be a particular root bar because it be made with citric acid. I be talking about Capt'n Eli's Root Beer. The "orangey" flavor complimented the other flavors such as the wintergreen and the anise. Capt'n Eli's is bottled and brewed by Shipyard Brewing Co, LLC in Portland, ME. Me thinks this warrants a visit to Maine just to have a Capt'n Eli's. More information can be found at  http://www.captneli.com/rootbeer.php also while you are here, view the comics that feature the adventures of Capt'n Eli.

This root beer had some bark. No, it's not that root beer that you're thinking of that comes in a gray can and is spelled with a Q. I'm talking about Margo's Bark Root Beer. A particular brand root beer that when you make a purchase, the proceeds go towards helping to shelter dogs. The root beer is great too; the formula contains all natural cane sugar, nutmeg, wintergreen, molasses (that's new), vanilla (a common ingredient found in some root beers. i.e. A & W), clove, cassia (what is that?) and extract of yucca (which made the root beer taste gooda (Sorry). There's even a picture of Margo on the label. If you want to read about this root beer and the charity, go to http://margosbark.com/

Red Ribbon Soda Works Root Beer, Home Brewed Style; a very unique root beer because I was able to get consistent carbonation in every sip. Also made with cane sugar. What makes this root beer unique is it is made with pinpoint carbonation. I looked it up and I still don't understand it. For more information on this root beer, go here http://www.natronabottlingcompany.com/

Americana Root Beer; pretty basic root beer, but made with Cane Sugar, and bottled in Washington at Orca Beverage Inc. For information on this root beer and the bottling plant click here on the following link http://www.orcabeverage.com/ .

The Root Beer Adventure Continues

I went to the Old Town Root Beer Company, Temecula, again and I purchased another set of root beers. This was two weeks ago and I purchased a Death Valley Root Beer and a Bulldog Root Beer (Not Mug, because their logo is also a bulldog). I tried the Death Valley Root Beer first, and it tasted....like a weak A&W, because of the vanilla, but it was made with Indian Wells Artesian Spring Water and it could have been better, if I drank it immediately, because it tasted a little flat.

The Original Bulldog Root Beer, I tried that on New Years Eve. It contained, honey, cane sugar, real vanilla, and to me, a first, salt. It too was flat, because I waited too long to drink it, but it was good too. I was hoping for more saltiness, but it was probably complimented and overpowered by the vanilla.

On New Year's Day 2012, my dad presented with another root beer that I saw at OTRB, Temecula, a Virgil's Root Beer, Special Edition Bavarian Nutmeg. It is bottled in a Spring Top Topper and according to the bottle was the original container. So I tried it and it wasn't anything special and was kind of a let down. I guess I'm not the root beer purist that I thought I was (The bottle said that the Bavarian Nutmeg is dedicated to the root beer purist). It seemed to be watered down to me and not that flavorful. I guess my hopes were too high, because I know that Nutmeg has a very pungent smell when put on the top of egg nog or mixed with other spices in baked goods. That's probably American Nutmeg and not Bavarian Nutmeg. I finished it, even though, I was given the privilege to dump it down the drain. I thought that if I kept drinking it, some flavor would jump out. I even drunk a glass of water to clean my mouth, so I could taste the nutmeg. It was also a let down because previously, back in Aug '11, I tried a regular Virgil's Root Beer and that was quite tasty. It also could have been a bad brew, but we'll see.

More root beer adventures to come.

For more information on The Original Bulldog Root Beer, go to http://www.bulldogrootbeer.com/. For history on Root Beer, go to this link http://www.bulldogrootbeer.com/RBhistory.htm