a few months ago i went to my local Walgreens to get something or other, maybe a prescription or perhaps some cold and flu medicine or whatever, that is not the important thing here, stay focused! anyway, so i go there and happen to glance at the soda selection as i have a habit of doing every time i pass any bottled beverages at all. to my shock and delight i see a new root beer brand! both regular and diet! whoa! as i think i was ill at the time and i had a huge backup of sodas in my fridge, i did not get it right then. but i went back recently, having totally forgotten it was there and was happy again to see it still there, yet annoyed at my memory for failing me yet again. ug, getting old i guess. so i bought it.
and now i am drinking it. and it is very tasty. which sort of goes against my slight bias against big corporations and their beverage attempts. i guess sometimes they get it right. glass bottle? check! no corn syrup, actual sugar? check! tastes good? check! sometimes i think i should do some sort of blind tasting so i am not influenced by the brand name or packaging or whatever. i do try to be impartial to that stuff though. but the fact that they went to the trouble of not using high fructose corn syrup and bottled in glass shows to me that they are trying to make something of quality. this soda has just the right amount of creaminess so it goes down well but urges you not to just chug it. the carbonation level is very good, it is present and adds its fun to the mix yet it does not overwhelm or strike back against you. i suppose it loses a couple points for being a bit too predictable in flavor, i hope for some, at least slight, variety to set it apart. i will be getting this a lot more often i think as it is probably the easiest o find, very good root beer. shocking! have i sold out my punk rock/DIY/indie ideals? stay tuned for my review of the diet version eventually and see!
Anthony’s Rating: 88
User’s Rating: 82
# of ratings:32
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| Type: | Root Beer | Comes In: | 16oz glass bottle |
| Available: | AL, AK, AZ, AR, CA, CO, CT, DE, FL, GA, HI, ID, IL, IN, IA, KS, KY, LA, ME, MD, MA, MI, MN, MS, MO, MT, NE, NV, NH, NJ, NM, NY, NC, ND, OH, OK, OR, PA, RI, SC, SD, TN, TX, UT, VT, VA, WA, WV, WI, WY, everywhere | Obtained in: | Walgreens, Bound Brook, NJ |
| Head: | Small | Sweetener: | sugar |
| Caffeine: | No | ||
| Website: | http://walgreens.com | ||
Funny, I just bought this the other day at walgreens also. They also had the walgreens brand rootbeer. I liked the walgreens brand better, as did my two friends. I thought this one was ok. I rated it at 65. Keep up the good work. Rick b
If you try them side by side please let me know which you like better, my friends agreed, the other was better. But like you said, we all have different tastes. Rick b
This was the best $1.19 I’ve spent in a while. My only wish would be that they up the flavoring by about 5-10% and leave everything else as is.
I kept trying to figure out what particular flavor note I would boost, (maybe wintergreen or nutmeg) but I couldn’t hone in on any one thing. It was pretty well-balanced, so I would just have liked a bit more of everything, flavor-wise. Kind of like old-style fountain sodas, when they add an extra squirt of syrup.
Still, it made for a lovely ride home from Walgreen’s, and it’s enough to make me choose Walgreen’s for other stuff just so I can grab a bottle while I’m there.
Well, here I am, drinking the two side by side. I have to say, I prefer the Deerfield. There’s a harshness to the Walgreen’s, and the flavors aren’t quite balanced. It’s almost medicinal. The only thing I like about it is the strength.
I wish the Deerfield was as strong. But it’s way more balanced, and it has a long finish. Jeez, sounds like wine. This does remind me of the difference between cheap wine and not cheap wine. The Deerfield lingers, and it’s pleasant all the way from first sniff to last burp. The Walgreen’s is stronger, but it disappears as soon as you swallow it.
You’re right, though, different strokes. And if you prefer the Walgreen’s, you save 30 cents.
This rootbeer was actually better when it warmed up! While cold, it almost tasted flowery. But once it got room temerature, it was decent. I still prefer Henry Wienhard’s.
Mine was like drinking flavored water. It went down real smooth and tasted pretty good, but the carbonation was far too low.
This is a surprisingly good product, and of course readily available. And it’s often on sale for a buck. One nice thing, not mentioned in the review, is that the bottles are a quite-generous 16 ounces.
Art
An okay root beer that used to be available in our local Walgreen’s stores. It was the only acceptable option there cuz it didn’t use HFCS but instead “sugar”–which, unfortunately probably means refined white sugar from genetically engineered beets. Kind of a simple, narrow-spectrum flavor.