Last Christmas my son gave me some different root beer candies that I hadn’t ever had. He found them at Fresh Thyme, a sort of organic “farmer’s market” that sells the sorts of things you’d expect from that type of place. In their candy section they have several types of old fashion candies including these root beer drops. As far as I can tell, they are actually made for Fresh Thyme, so that’s what I’m saying the brand is. They are only my second root beer drops ever, so I wonder just how different they are from the first.
The nice sugar dusting flavor gives way to a rather generic, minty root beer flavor. The more you suck on it, the stronger the wintergreen flavor grows, to almost overpower the root beer. It’s not bad though, just not as good as it could be.
They’re slightly different, I would say, not as good. But it’s really hard to have a standout or an utter failure amongst root beer hard candies. That said, I probably would never buy them again, but at the same time if someone gave me some, I wouldn’t be upset.
Cappy’s is a chowder house in Camden, Maine that’s been there since 1979. It’s named after Cappy Quinn, who actually never was officially affiliated with their restaurant. Rather he was an old salt who could be found around the Camden waterfront and was an inspiration to all. The root beer itself is actually bottled and supplied by Private Label Specialties which means it’s most likely really made by GinsenUp. However, the Cappy’s folks claim it’s made specially for them with a unique recipe, which is in line with what GinsengUp does, so it appears to be its own root beer. Unless they’re lying in which case they’ll burn in the special fires prepared for those who deceive root beer reviewers and scowl unnecessarily long at baby koalas. It’s another sailing themed root beer, of which the world cannot have too many.
Not far from my house is a lovely craft ice cream shop called Honey & Mackie’s. They do small batch, hand mixed flavors that are truly top notch. Many a summer afternoon or evening, we’ve strolled there to get a waffle cone full of their decadent treats. They also have fries. Loaded fries that are kind of like a poutine, but not exactly but will definitely fill you up and are as high quality as their ice cream. So yeah, it’s one of those gems you find sometimes. They rotate through various flavors and this past week they made root beer ice cream, so I had to get some. Their method was to use root beer candy sticks, crush them up, and mix them in. I wasn’t sure how that would work, but I immediately went and bought a quart to give it a try. 
