This isn’t your regular gourmet root beer. It’s one of those few that are actually brewed using the highest quality ingredients (according to their site) such as cane sugar, real vanilla, and honey. The label itself is rather classy but falls victim to far too many root beer cliches. First is the dogs. So many root beers with dogs on the label. This one takes it a bit further since the entire brewery is named after a dog. The two dogs do have names, Barley and Hops, but so do most of the other dog root beers. Also, Bulldog sports “The Original”, a tag line whose disappearance from labels would bring nothing but immense joy, along with “Handcrafted” which isn’t nearly as overused but still too prevalent. Their bold “Unleash the Taste” (pun I’m sure is intended), though, is a nice and very appropriate slogan.
The Body is wonderful! Lots of honey, vanilla, and the other essential flavors. Sweet and creamy, the kind of flavor you could just snuggle up to if that were possible. The Bite is not much but sufficient. The whole thing has a very rich and smooth mouth feel from the maltodextrin. The Head is frothy but not much, not flat by any means just less than is desirable. The Aftertaste is of vanilla and honey and very pleasing though a little sticky.
When I took the first drink I exclaimed “Oh wow!” This is one of the best tasting root beers that I have ever had the pleasure to drink. “Unleash the Taste” indeed! I don’t care what their label is like, I’ll drink this stuff whenever I can get it. It’s really a shame about that Head, if it were tall and extra frothy this may have made it into the highest echelon of root beer rankings. However, I am still very proud to award it my Seal of Approval. See how it rates against other root beers.
First of all, I know it doesn’t say “Draft Style” on the bottle. However, their 
Not the Roman Empire nor the Galactic Empire, or even the lesser known Ajuuraan Empire, this is the Empire Bottling Works which seems to have no ties to any empires at all. Rather they are from the smallest state in the Union which would be a more pathetic empire than the Ajuuraan (should Rhode Island empirify). This leaves me completely lost as to the reason for the name. It’s not even like they’re from New York with the whole Empire State nickname and whatnot (why you would want to call a state governed by representative democracy the Empire State is an entirely different matter all together) so really I’ve got nothing. They don’t even have a website (their empire is too small evidently) so it’s not like you can just look it up. They do provide a phone number on the bottle so I suppose if I really cared (or cared during business hours in the eastern time zone), I could just call them. Besides the phone number, the bottle has a little crown which is the only empire related thing other than the name. 
