A-Treat Draft Style Birch Beer

This had been sitting in my fridge for a while, and I finally opened it:

 

Brand: A-Treat Draft Style Birch Beer.

Origin: Orefield, PA.

Purchase Place: Blue Sun Soda, Spring Lake Park, MN.

Sweetener: Cane Sugar.

Review: Something about the kind of bland logo made me less excited to try this. But the first sip changed that pretty quickly! This was a real solid soda! I often don't care for birch beers, but this one tasted a lot like root beer - I mean... many of them do, but this one didn't disappoint. It's a bit heavy on the wintergreen (not TOO heavy) and it goes down smooth. A surprisingly fun soda! 

Score: 8.5 out of 10.

Reading Draft Blueberry Birch Soda

Well, it's Tuesday, so I guess that means I have another soda review from my classroom in Minneapolis (I think this is the 3rd week in a row):

Brand: Reading Draft Blueberry Birch Soda.

Origin: Reading, PA.

Purchase Place: Blue Sun Soda, Spring Lake Park, MN.

Sweetener: Pure Cane Sugar.

Review: So "birch" sodas usually have a bit of a sharpness to them, but I expect a "blueberry" soda to be more smooth. So what was this going to be? The answer is: both. The initial sip has that sharpness I expect with a birch soda / birch beer, but then each sip ends with the softness and smoothness of a sugary blueberry soda. It's an interesting combination. I'm not a HUGE fan of most birch beers, so I think the sweetness of the blueberry made the birch beer flavor more enjoyable for me. Still just an OK soda, but a fun combo of flavors. 

Score: 5 out of 10.

 

Hosmer Mountain White Birch Beer

As we were doing a lot of cooking last night, I opened this:

Brand: Hosmer Mountain White Birch Beer.

Origin: Willimantic, CT.

Purchase Place: Blue Sun Soda, Spring Lake Park, MN.

Sweetener: Pure Cane Sugar.

Review: This was good! If I wasn't told it was a "white birch beer," I would have called it a clear root beer. It tasted like a rich root beer that was heavy on the anise (but not TOO heavy). My boys tried sips of this too, and they loved it. I really don't have any complaints! I'm ranking this quite high!

Score: 9.5 out of 10!
 

Pennsylvania Dutch Birch Beer

I cracked into this yesterday:

Brand: Pennsylvania Dutch Birch Beer

Origin: Pennsauken, NJ.

Purchase Place: "Minnesota's Largest Candy Store," Jordan, MN.

Sweetener: High Fructose Corn Syrup.

Review: I'm never quite sure how to describe a birch beer. Maybe like a "cleaner" or crisper root beer? I dunno. This one is easier to describe. First of all, it's good. Secondly, I'd describe the flavor as a mix between a deep cola mixed with a light root beer. This was REALLY good. It had some fruity undertones (like a good cola would have), but then a slight herbiness like a root beer. I enjoyed this a lot. This one gets a pretty high score.

Score: 9 out of 10.

Foxon Park Diet White Birch Soda

I cracked into this last night after a big week of class:

Brand: Foxon Park Diet White Birch Soda.

Origin: East Haven, Connecticut.

Purchase Place: "Minnesota's Largest Candy Store," Jordan, MN.

Sweetener: Aspartame.

Review: This smelled a lot like root beer. It tasted like a creamy, weak root beer with lots of carbonation. It had the typical diet soda issue: the flavor was weak. It wasn't bad, but it was nothing special. I'll give this an average score.

Score: 5 out of 10.

Hippo Size Burley Birch Beer

It's been hot. I grabbed this to cool down:

Brand: Hippo Size Burley Birch Beer.

Origin: Mukilteo, WA.

Purchase Place: Frattallone's Ace Hardware, St. Paul, MN.

Sweetener: Cane Sugar.

Review: This tasted like an herby root beer. It wasn't bad, but it didn't stand out as anything super amazing either. Decent overall.

Score: 5 out of 10.

Boylan's Creamy Red Birch Beer

I've had this in the fridge for the last few days, and I finally cracked into it yesterday:

Brand: Boylan's Creamy Red Birch Beer.

Origin: Teterboro, NJ.

Purchase Place: Frattallones Ace Hardware, St. Paul, MN.

Sweetener: Cane Sugar.

Review: I tried to figure out this flavor. It was VERY creamy, but it still had a slight bite at the end. It tasted like a creamy cola that had a little bit of cherry and vanilla in it. It was different and unique, but it was good and will be pleasing to a lot of people! (Usually, I think unique sodas will be gross to a lot of people and tasty to just a select few, but I feel like this doesn't fit that mold - it's better.) It's a little on the sugary side, but if you're like me and you like sugar, then it's pretty great.

Score: 8.5 out of 10.

Frostop Red Birch Beer

My son and I stopped at the Frattallone's Ace Hardware on Lake Street in Minneapolis a few days ago. After seeing that the Ace on Grand Ave in St. Paul had no root beer selection, we had to see what this one had to offer. They had a few things I wanted to try:

They were all Frostops, and I didn't have a great experience with Frostop Root Beer when I had it in 2012. So I wasn't sure if these would be OK or not. I started with the Red Birch Beer as I was doing some yard work.

This had a very red color. I had to pour some in a glass to show it off:

Back-lit by my kitchen window.

Brand: Frostop Red Birch Beer.

Origin: Hopkins, MN.

Purchase Place: Frattallones Ace Hardware, Minneapolis, MN.

Sweetener: High Fructose Corn Syrup and Cane Sugar.

Review: This was surprisingly good. I got a hint of cherry and cinnamon out of this, and it had a little sharpness. The best way I can describe this is like if you were to eat Bottle Caps candy and pop a Root Beer one and a Cherry one in your mouth at the same time. Boom. It'd taste just like this. A bit of root beer, a hint of cherry, and just a touch of cinnamon. Tasty. Goes down well. And it's nice that it comes in a larger resealable bottle - I enjoyed this over the course of 2 days.

Score: 9 out of 10.

Reading Draft White Birch Beer

I had to grab a soda as I was working on organizing my studio the other night:

Brand: Reading Draft White Birch Beer.

Origin: Reading, PA.

Purchase Place: "Minnesota's Largest Candy Store," Jordan, MN.

Sweetener: Cane Sugar.

Review: This tasted like a smooth root beer with a slightly different taste. It was smooth and tasty. There's a strong/sweet vanilla flavor along with ALMOST a bit of a fruity kick. You could have told me it was root beer, and I would have thought "oh, well that's a 'different' take on root beer, but I like it." This was my 3rd birch beer, and it ranks between the 9 that I gave Sioux City Birch Beer and the 7 that I gave Rocky Mountain Soda Company Boulder Birch Beer. Pretty good. I really need to hunt down more birch beers.

Score: 7.5 out of 10.

Another Trip to "Minnesota's Largest Candy Store"

Last week, my son and I made another trip to "Minnesota's Largest Candy Store" in Jordan Minnesota. It was our 2nd trip in just under 4 weeks.

Seen from the south heading north on Hwy 169.

My Mom and son looking for some treats.  Too bad they were all out of candy...  :)

I picked up a bag of these.

I SHOULD have gotten a bag of these, but I didn't.

My new case of assorted sodas: about half root beer and half "other."

That case contained the following ROOT BEERS:
- Bedford
- Brownie Caramel Cream
- Sparkies
- River City
- Saint Arnold
- Waialua Soda Works
- Dog n Suds Diet
- Empire Diet
- Golden Maple
- Druthers Black Cow Vanilla Creme
- Grown-Up Soda

And the following ASSORTED SODAS:
- Spiffy Cola
- The Pop Shoppe Cream Soda
- Buddy's Grape
- Reading Draft White Birch
- The Wizard of Oz Cherry Cola
- Empire Orange
- Iron Horse Black Cherry
- Hank's Black Cherry
- Lost Trail Black Cherry
- Boylan Black Cherry
- Sioux City Cream Soda

And I got 2 "NOVELTY SODAS:"

- Cookies and Cream Bites Soda
- Lester's Fixins Peanut Butter and Jelly

HERE'S the post from a month ago when were were at Minnesota's Largest Candy Store (where I took a lot of photos of their soda selection.

Stay tuned for more updates on these sodas and the root beer candies. It's going to be a tasty fall!

Rocky Mountain Soda Company Boulder Birch Beer

After a big day of running around with my 2 year old son, I needed something tasty during his nap...

Brand: Rocky Mountain Soda Company Boulder Birch Beer.

Origin: Commerce City, CO.

Purchase Place: Rocket Fizz, somewhere in CO.

Sweetener: Beet Sugar.

Review: This tasted surprisingly like root beer, but it was a bit more "earthy" and "woodsy." If you told me it was root beer, I'd think it was MAYBE slightly sub-par because it didn't taste like true root beer. But as a birch beer, it's not bad. It's not as good as my first birch beer, but it's still pretty good. I think need to search out more birch beers...

Score: 7 out of 10.

Goodies in the Mail

I got a surprise on our front step yesterday.

First layer.

Second layer

Some blogger friends who follow my triathlon blog sent me some sugary treats from Colorado.

"Soda Shaq?"  Seems suspicious.  Gotta try it.

Tommyknocker Strawberry Creme, and a set of 5 Rocky Mountain Soda Company sodas.

Theresa and Brandon tell me that Soda Shaq is a 7-11 exclusive, and that the 6 others are from local brews ("local" to them in CO). They hadn't tried them, so they're curious what I think of them.

THANKS GUYS!! I'll be trying these all shortly, so check back to see if I like having some of Shaq's cream in my mouth...

Sioux City Birch Beer

I've been curious about birch beer, but until the other night, I hadn't tried it. I finally sat down with a bottle of Sioux City Birch Beer. I've had their Root Beer and their Sarsaparilla before, and they were pretty good. What would this be like?

Brand: Sioux City Birch Beer.

Origin: Whitestone, NY.

Purchase Place: Frattallone's Ace Hardware, Burnsville, MN.

Sweetener: Cane Sugar.

Review: I was really surprised by this. It was very tasty. The flavor was just a little different than root beer, and it was actually quite a bit better than Sioux City Root Beer. It's like root beer with a slight "berry" kick. I expected it to be earthier for some reason, but it was very good. If you like creamy yet sharp root beer, try this birch beer! Now excuse me while I go find some more birch beers to try out...

Score: 9 out of 10.

A New Place to Get Root Beer in the South Metro!

About 2 months ago, someone named Mike sent me an e-mail. Here was the first part of his note:

Hey Steve,
I found a really weird but great place to buy root beer if you're ever in the south metro - Ace Hardware in Burnsville.  It opened a few months ago and I went in to get some caulk and saw a glorious row with about 50 different kinds of soda!  It's mostly root beers but also some cream soda, ginger beer, and others...

On Thursday night, I was heading back to St. Paul from south of the Metro, and I thought I'd swing by and check it out. It's right on County Road 42, just past the Burnsville Mall on the north side of the road, so it's only about a mile from the 35E / 35W split.

I walked in and a woman asked if she could help me. I smirked a bit and said "I heard you have a lot of root beers..." She smirked back and said "Follow me..."  We stopped at this:

37 kinds of soda on this side...

... and 46 more kinds on this side.

Doing the math, they had 88 different kinds of soda!! There are 84 different kinds picture above between those 2 photos, and they had another small shelf of 4 different kinds of slightly cheaper root beers. Oh, and I guess they had a refrigerated case in the front of "normal" sodas like Mountain Dew and Dr. Pepper, but I'm not counting those.

I started filling a box, thinking I'd get maybe a dozen different kinds. (There's a price break at 6 bottles and at 24 bottles.) Well, the first time I stopped to count how many bottles were in my box, I already had 20. So I figured I'd grab 4 more and get the "24 bottle discount." (I saved about $0.25 / bottle by getting 24.) Here's a photo of what I bought once I got it home:

The woman who lead me to the sodas and chatted with me as I picked out my selection mentioned that a good dark rum is GREAT with Birch Beer, so I'll have to try that some time.

Oh, and just so I remember what 24 kinds I bought, here's a list of what's in the box:


ROOT BEERS:
- Route 66
- Sea Dog
- Caruso's Legacy Robusto
- Sioux City
- Frostie
- AJ Stephans
- Dog n Suds
- Capt'n Eli's

NON-ROOT BEERS:
- Malta Goya Malt Beverage
- Diet Cheerwine
- AJ Stephans Cream Soda
- Nesbitt's Orange
- Sioux City Birch Beer
- Route 66 Lime Soda
- Route 66 Black Cherry
- Faygo Rock & Rye
- Cock n' Bull Ginger Beer
- Jack Black's Blood Red Cola
- Jarritos Mexican Cola
- Apple Beer (the brand and flavor)
- Flathead Lake Wild White Grape

"UNIQUE" SODAS:
- Coco Fizz Chocolate Soda
- Empire Bottling Works Banana
- Flathead Lake Granny Apple


(Next time I stop by, I'll bring this list to make sure I don't get any repeats...)