What Say You?

I like root beer…a lot! So imagine my excitement when me and the Mrs. settled in to watch a show on the Food Network a couple months ago and they made their way to a specialty root beer brewery in Wisconsin. Good root beer! And not just root beer, but they use the recipe in their BBQ sauce and they make vanilla and orange cream drinks, etc. Well, after checking around, I couldn’t find it anywhere out west. So I went to their website to buy it http://www.sprecherbrewery.com/. A 12 pack is only $10.20…sweet! Ok…add to cart…proceed to checkout….uh-oh...$19.30 shipping and handling…so $29.50 for a 12 pack…not too bad really, but what if I don’t like it? At $2.50 a bottle, maybe not worth it…end of story…or is it?

So my wife takes me to this new candy shop, Powell’s Sweet Shoppe. This place is awesome…all kinds of “old school” candy and they have a t.v. that plays Willy Wonka all day long. You can look around there forever and you don’t need to be a kid or take a kid to appreciate it. First thing I see though when I walk in is a refrigerator on the side wall with all kinds of colored and specialty drinks…so I said to myself, “Self…see if they have any specialty root beer.” You guessed it! My eyes focused in on that yellow-beeked bird on the bottle like the mother ship was calling me home! I swear the rest of the room went dark and the bottled glowed, while in the background you could hear the beginning of 2001 A Space Odyssey….dah…dah…dah…….dah-nah!

I grabbed 2 and went to the clerk, “How much, sir?” He said, “2 bucks a bottle.” I couldn’t get out my debit card fast enough. Then I said, “Wait, I gotta try it and make sure I want to buy more than 1.” Now I wasn’t thirsty and there was no way I was going to drink 16 ounces, but it was the moment of truth. One sip…and I bought 2.

After nursing that one down over the rest of the night and the next day, I thought to myself, do I really like it because it is better or because I want it to be? It’s hard to make this long story short…so let me sum up…I had to do a taste test.

So, Sunday night I went to the store to round up the usual suspects. Here were the participants, introduced by price/prestige:

• Big K (59cent 2/liter), less than $0.01/ounce
• Barqs, $0.02/ounce
• A&W and Mug, $0.023/ounce
• Thomas Kemper $0.063/ounce
• Henry Weinhard’s $0.064/ounce
• Sprecher $0.125/ounce

I tip my cap to the Mrs. for humoring me and setting up the taste test. Actually, I did stumble a bit out of the gate. As I started to take all the root beer out of the refrigerator and line up the glasses, my son asked me what I was doing. I immediately responded with a smile, “Mommy and Daddy are going to play a drinking game!” Now some things you don’t clearly think through when you say them…and my son loves games so I was only trying to make it fun for him too. Let’s just say as soon as the words had left my lips, I heard my wife from the other room, “Don’t tell him that! It’s a taste test!” I think we cleared that obstacle, but if you hear him say we played a “drinking game” when you are at church this Sunday…please give us the benefit of the doubt.

With that behind us, I gave each of the competitors an equal chance. I rinsed and chilled 7 small “drinking mugs” (I wised up and didn’t call them shot glasses) and placed them in the freezer for a couple minutes so each beverage would be welcomed into a frosty glass for maximum results. Here’s how it went down.

I sipped the first glass…pretty good I thought. The 2nd was very good as well (I was pretty sure it was the Henry’s). Although, after 2 that I liked I was thinking, “I’m a retard.” I was afraid I was going to like all of them and began to worry a bit. I have always thought Henry’s made a great root beer and the Sprecher I had a few days earlier was my new “pretty little pet.” Now I was going to prove myself a dingbat.

Then a sip of #3…my faith restored again…this one was terrible! #4…ok, but not near as good as 1 & 2. #5 about the same as #4. It was then I drank #6…as I sit here tonight writing this I still maintain that glass did not contain root beer! Terrible, does not do the name of the beverage justice. Finally #7…oh yeah…that’s a good root beer!

I then went back through the lineup one more time to confirm what I liked. Truthfully, I wanted to know what I did like the best and let the chips fall where they may. Yep, I still rank them #7 and #2 best followed by #1, then by #4 and #5, and #3 and #6 should be removed from all retail shelves immediately!

So what #’s were which ones? Here are my results from favorite to “not fit for human consumption”:

1. Sprecher (oh, I still love my pretty little pet)
2. Henry Weinhard’s
3. A&W
4. Mug
5. Big K
6. Thomas Kemper
7. Barqs

Naturally, I then set up the test for my wife and here are her results:

1. Henry Weinhard’s
2. Mug
3. Big K
4. A&W
5. Sprecher
6. Thomas Kemper
7. Barqs

I clearly love the Sprecher root beer. Obviously, my wife isn’t sophisticated enough to appreciate the full taste. That being said, Henry’s was a clear favorite and although the night before when we went out to pizza I had a Henry’s and my wife had a Barqs because she “likes it”…it is clearly an inferior root beer. For the record, our son liked A&W and Mug the best when he played the drinking game.

In my opinion, if you are down and out and need a shot of root beer, stop by Fred Meyer and get yourself a 59cent 2 liter bottle of Big K. For “every day” consumption A&W makes a good choice along with Mug. If you’re going to throw a Super Bowl party and want to get me something nice to drink, spring for a 6-pack of Henry’s. And if you forgot to buy me something for my birthday…stop by Powell’s and load me up with a Sprecher’s.

I’ve still got a lot of root beer in the fridge so feel free to stop by and join us for a drinking game some time!