I’d been trying to get this for about a year. I couldn’t find anyone who sold it online so I went straight to the company. They said they’d send some, but then they couldn’t get around to it and asked me to check back with them in a couple of months. Every few months I’d send them an email and finally gave up. I even ordered some from Beverages Direct. Then out of nowhere, they asked if I still wanted some and what my address was. I told them (I can’t ever say no to a root beer offer) and low and behold, it arrived before my order. They even threw in a bottle of their Red Cow and Orange Cow for me to try. While it’s called Black Cow, they’ve got a picture of a Holstein cow on the label, which is partially black, so I guess I’ll let it slide. Clearly though, they’re going for a root beer float type root beer, or a black cow, a point even more reinforced by the “Vanilla Creme” and just put the cow on there for the pun. I guess it went over so well that they wanted to extend it to other flavors like orange and red … but I’ve never heard of an orange cow, let alone a red cow. Those also feature Holsteins on the labels but the black parts are either orange or red respectively. Hmm.
The Body is light and creamy and rather refreshing. It tastes a lot like a root beer float, which is what they’re going for. It has an interesting mouth feel with only the mildest of Bites. The Head is tall but fizzes away in the blink of an eye. The Aftertaste is vanilla cream, like store brand vanilla ice cream, that lasts awhile.
Interesting. It really does comes across like a root beer float, a generic store brand root beer float, but a root beer float nonetheless. However, instead of being extra syrupy, it is a light and refreshing drink. Not bad. It could use a lot of improvement, especially on the Head since an extra frothy Head is a hallmark of a root beer float, but as it stands it’s well worth getting occasionally for your picnic. See how it rates against other root beers.
I keep wanting to call this Johnnie Walker instead of Johnnie Ryan. Not that I drink whiskey, but I do see it all the time in Duty Free Shops. There’s also several points of branding similarity. Johnny Walker has for a logo a distinguished looking fellow with a top hat and a cane, Johnnie Ryan has got a logo that is just a top hat and a cane, minus the gentleman. Then there’s Johnnie Walker Red Label, and Johnnie Ryan has a red label. So you can see why it would be easy to get confused. As far as I can tell from reading the various websites, there is no affiliation between the two (unlike Dr. McGillicudy’s which makes schnapps and root beer) and so I’m going to just chalk it up to an uncanny coincidence. The bottle is pretty unique and it was the first time I’d seen this type before when I reviewed it. The only downside is that it isn’t quite 12 oz, so you feel a bit ripped off by the whole thing.
First of all, the label is slightly terrifying. I don’t know the style that they are going for, but the guy/girl … person with the enormous eyes, huge lips, and long tongue with a burger in one hand and a root beer in the other is frightening. Secondly, for a ‘giant’ root beer, it is the SAME FREAKING SIZE AS EVERY OTHER ROOT BEER! Though after following the website on the bottle (which actually works to their credit) I learned that this is a burger joint in West Seattle called Zippy’s Giant Burgers, so that’s where the Giant Root Beer comes from. For a single burger joint with only one location to have their own brand of bottled root beer is really cool (and local at that), so they are forgiven for name, and even the terrifying bottle. However, they also claim “a classic since 2008”. Now normally such a claim would require several decades to pass before you can claim you have a classic product, even though technically it is a correct usage of the word, so I’m going to say they’re jumping the gun a bit. 
