After so many years, the Safeway brand is finally being bottled. I’ve been waiting for this moment since I first started seeking out gourmet root beer and Safeway was the only supermarket in my little town. The brand has changed from the old Cragmont days of my youth. This latest brand is Signature Select, but since you can read titles you already knew that. I still like the old Cragmont logos better than what they’ve got now, but it isn’t too bad a label, pretty much what you’d expect from a store brand. I found it in the local Safeway the month I was moving to Minnesota and it was the last brew I reviewed in the state of Washington before saying goodbye. I find it fitting that my final Washington brew should be the one I wished existed since the beginning of this quest of mine, nearly 20 years ago.
The Body is sweet and kind of creamy with a generic flavor. There’s some vanilla and some sour tinge to it as well. The Bite is harsh on carbonation and low on spices. The Head is tall, but goes fast. The Aftertaste is an herbal vanilla that’s not overly appealing.
I want to like this brew. I really, really want to like this, but I don’t. It’s just not very good. What a disappointment. But I guess that’s for the best, leaving the state and all, it would be problematic if there were a root beer holding me back. See how it rates against other root beers.