Mission Hard Root Beer
(Mission Brewery, San Diego)
The scent that drifted up to us was so very tempting. The scent was old fashioned root beer. At that moment, we wanted to love this. But, after the first sip, it’s just too much.
Too much licorice, too much burnt sugar…
We bought root beer. We want root beer… not licorice soda. After the first sip, the root beer gets lost under all of that distracting licorice. Normally, we’d enjoy the barely sweet quality. Actually, we were hoping for something with less sweetness than the other hard root beers that we’ve tasted. But, oddly, this one takes it over the bridge a step too far. Without the sugar, the burnt sugar flavor turns strangely chemical and noxiously artificial in an “Am I drinking poison?” sort of way. To put it in a nicer way, there’s a seriously strong medicinal quality that lingers. It’s not entirely unpleasant. There are brief moments of something interesting in there. But, it’s just too much. We hate to say it. This medicine needs another spoonful of sugar. The lingering aftertaste turns this into an unpleasant memory. Overall, it’s just too medicinal. We both found it intensely medicinal and downright overbearing after more than a couple sips. Between the two of us, we couldn’t finish a bottle. To be fair, we did try on multiple occasions. Every time it was simply too much for us.
But, this could work well in small doses for a cocktail where you’re looking for an herbal licorice and burnt sugar element.
