You've maybe seen it on some billboards around downtown Toronto: a "hard" root beer by MadJack, a brewery under the galaxy sized Molson umbrella. As a lover of both root beer and regular beer, I was intrigued, and took the opportunity to purchase one the next time I was at a Beer Store.
Upon first sniff I was optimistic. It had that root beer scent all right: sweet and caney with that faint suggestion of bitterness. The colour was exactly correct also, a dark brown swampish hue promising an adult version of your favourite slumber party drink.
Tasting it however, did not bring back priceless memories of childhood lore. Rather, that I'm an adult drinking sugary booze at two in the afternoon. The flavour resembles root beer sure, but the kind of root beer you buy from a supermarket vending machine for 35 cents. It lacks that lingering sweetness that quality root beers feature, while retaining that inevitable stomachache from drinking something too sugary. The complete absence of an after taste will make you pine for those simpler days of cheetos and 9pm late nights, not relive them.
I can only suggest MadJack Root Beer if you really wanna get drunk and drink root beer, but are too poor/lazy to just buy rum and mix it with some A&W. Otherwise you'll probably be disappointed. I admire the ambition though.
Rating (out of 10 'L's) -- LLL
