Bottled Root Beers – Page 86 – Eric’s Gourmet Root Beer Blog

Dublin Texas Root Beer

Apr 092014

Dublin Texas Root Beer Bottle I first heard about the Dublin Bottling Works when news of the lawsuit and the end of Dublin Dr Pepper broke. While I was sympathetic towards the plight of those who loved the drink, would miss the drink, or whose livelihoods depended on the drink, I didn’t like the drink. Or rather, I don’t like Dr Pepper or any of the imitations and never had, so I really couldn’t lament much even though I’ve never tried that particular version of it. But Dublin Bottling Works, being from Texas, won’t let The Man keep them down, and have replaced their Dublin Dr Pepper with Dublin Texas Root Beer. Now this is a very positive thing in my opinion. Replacing I flavor I don’t like with one I do. It’s not like they’re strangers to root beer either, they used to bottle Triple XXX. I’m not sure if they still do, but now they have their own original root beer. Since it was a new product launch, they were kind enough to send me a six pack for review.

The Body is sweet and a little creamy and full of the standard root beer flavors, so much so that it borders being generic tasting. It’s a little on the dark side as well. The Bite is prickly from carbonation but lacking in spice. The Head is tall but fizzes down at an average speed, faster than I feel it should. The Aftertaste is a sort of sticky caramel almost vanilla flavor.

Pretty good, but it doesn’t really have anything extra to really make me swoon. It is a solid brew for a barbeque or a float, but not quite sipping variety. But a good all around root beer like this is sure to be successful enough, even if it’s not my favorite. See how it rates against other root beers.

Waialua Soda Works Root Beer

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Apr 022014

Waialua Root Beer Bottle This is the first and only root beer that I’ve had so far from Hawaii. That begs the question of whether I’ve had a root beer from every state. Without looking back at the 200 odd brews I’ve tried at this point I can definitively say ‘no’. That’s because I have as of yet utterly failed to procure anything from Alaska. It’s up there, but I can’t get it. Someday … But anyhow, Waialua, since it’s from Hawaii, it has a hula girl on the label. Good. If it didn’t there would be problems for sure. There’s some other stuff there like “finest Hawaiian quality” and some squiggly lines at the bottom which may or may not be Japanese or some other Asian script, but who cares, there’s a hula girl and that is all that needs to be looked at. A curious thing about this is the sweetener used. They use “cane sugar” and “Maui natural white cane sugar”, the difference between those two is difficult to grasp. Since Hawaii is a sugar exporting state, I doubt they’re bringing in Brazilian sugar for this brew. So why not just call it all Hawaiian cane sugar? We may never know.

The Body was weak and not very flavorful, you could taste the right stuff but you had to look very hard to find it. The Bite was nothing special. The Head was large but not frothy at all. It fizzed away in several seconds. The Aftertaste was a very weak vanilla flavor that was almost instantly gone after it appeared.

So, way watered down. Maybe if they put two to three times the flavor it would be something worth talking about, however, as it was, when I finished drinking it, I looked down at my empty glass asking myself, what did I just drink? If it hadn’t said root beer on the label, I wouldn’t have known. See how it rates against other root beers.

AJ Stephans Root Beer

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Mar 192014

AJ Stephans Root Beer Bottle This is probably the first “Old Style” root beer I’ve had. It reminds me of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Movie where the Shredder is all “You fight well, in the old style …” So clearly Mr. Stephans’ recipe has been handed down to him from a family of ninja monks who practices the “Old Style”. The same can be said of his website at the time of writing this review. It’s interesting that AJ doesn’t focus on making sodas but rather “the finest elixirs and mixers in New England” They also seem to be pretty hung up on calling them tonics. It must be more of that old style talk. Their flagship flavor is a ginger beer so a mixer works for that. I’ve never really considered a root beer as a mixer before, and definitely not a tonic (not a good root beer anyways). Calling a root beer a tonic reminds me of the time on my mission I tried to make root beer with tonic water, which contains quinine, and I got the nastiest of surprises. Hopefully they haven’t gone down that route.

The Body is not very sweet and “dark” tasting if you know what I mean. There is lots of “flavor” (one of the ingredients) but I wouldn’t say that that is necessarily a good thing. There is not much Bite at all. The Head is nice though it could be frothier. The Aftertaste is sticky, almost cola-ish, and with more of the “flavor.” I think that I caught a hint of anise in there too.

My first reaction when I finished it, “Yeah, it’s a root beer.” Maybe calling it a tonic isn’t too far from the mark. Since I would still prefer this to drinking tonic water, their claim of having the best tonic in all of New England may not be false after all. Now claiming they make the best root beer, that’s something else. See how it rates against other root beers.

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