| >> |
No. 5205
Crossposting this from my Tumblr.
Alright, so I know this idea is about as original as anything else on the Internet nowadays, but fuck it. I’ve decided to start a mini-feature on my blog wherein I review different sodas and drinks. I’ve got a huge soft spot for strange drinks- sodas, energy drinks, teas, whatever else I can find. I like trying new things, I live in an area where it’s fairly easy to get different drinks (my favorite destination for new energy drinks, the gas station convenience store, exists in abundance in this city) and I’ve got nothing better to do. So, without further ado, the first installment of Darc Likes Soda.
The drink of choice today is Rootjack Pirate Root Beer, purchased from my favorite online retailer, ThinkGeek.com. It come in packs of 4, and was shipped with enough padding that nothing bad happened to it in transit. My first thought when looking at the bottle: It looks like somebody gave Tim Burton a Magic Marker and an orange sheet of construction paper and told him to draw a logo for a pirate drink. It’s got a pirate girl, complete with parrot, straddling a cannon, and the name “Rootjack” in stylized letters above her. The bottle mentions it’s orange flavored root beer, a “pirate energy drink” with guarana and vitamin C, and that it fights scurvy. Enough about the packaging, though. On to the drink.
Upon popping the top off (old school, no twist tops here) I noticed it had quite a head on it already. Whether that’s from jostling around in transit or something else, I have no idea. It smells quite nice- like root beer with a hint of orange. Like all root beer, it smells of vanilla, but unlike most root beer, the smell isn’t overpowering. It’s a good smell, overall- pleasantly low-key.
First taste: Ooh, more orange than I’d expected. The root beer part is about as expected- creamy, sort of spicy, tastes like pretty much every root beer in existence. This is no Virgil’s root beer, with its assortment of varied, subtle flavors. This drink, despite its smell, is about as subtle as… well, a pirate. It’s got a strong root beer taste with a nice sour orange bite, not too creamy, and despite marketing itself as an energy drink, there’s only the barest hint of guarana taste. Knowing ThinkGeek, though, it’s probably loaded with caffeine. Not that that’s a bad thing.
Final thoughts: Overall, I’m pleased. It’s a nice, easy to drink root beer with a pleasant orange flavor to it. Given a choice, I’d have made the root beer taste a bit stronger and sharper- not by much, though. The only real drawbacks are the price (both of the drink and the need to have it shipped) and the energy factor- if you need to sleep sometime soon, pick a different beverage. If you have an all-nighter ahead of you, though, you could certainly do worse than Rootjack. Try it out, matey.
|
