The 12 Days of POPmas Day 12: Candy Cane Train

  

So here I am doing my final day of the 12 days of POPmas on location at my parents' house on Christmas Eve. This room was my childhood playroom and there's still a ton of stuff in here from those younger years. I saved this particular soda for the end because it's a Christmas-themed pop and seemed appropriate for a Christmas Eve cocktail. This is Candy Cane Train. Which is a pretty odd name for a soda. That's like a chocolate soda called Chocolate Fountain Tractor. But obviously the picture shows a literal candy cane train, so I'll have to trust them on it. And to my delight I see there's a website posted right on the label, www.holidaysoda.com. I'm gonna give that a gander before trying this soda.

Fascinating...

Alright, well forget that then; I'm a little scared just how old this pop is seeing as their website is expired... Let's just jump right into drinking a carbonated candy cane shall we?

It smells faintly like a candy cane, but not much. It more or less just smells...old. Alright, last pop should be the best....right? (Takes a Santa sized sip). Eh...it's OK. I was expecting a little more of a peppermint BANG but it's more like a sugary red pop with the faintest of candy cane flavoring. It looks like the Candy Cane Train was a little light on its shipment this year. 2.5 out of 5 Santa Hats.

Alright! Made it though 13 different sodas in 12 days. Most of them were expired and most of them hurt my teeth and soul, but it was an adventure to say the least! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all my six readers!

The 12 Days of POPmas Day 11: Almond Creme Soda

Every so often, I come across something, whether it be a beer, food or a soda, that I know I'm not going to like, but I have to try it anyway. The curiosity always gets to me, and I've always lived by the motto of try anything once. I don't think there's ever been something I've 100% turned down. There's some things I'll never try again, but at least I can say I've tried it all once. Just in case someone every says, "oh yea, well I bet you've never tried Teriyaki Beef Jerky Soda!" To which I can respond, "like hell I haven't sir; like hell I haven't!" Anyway, that's kinda how I feel about this next soda: All Natural Almond Creme. We already know how I feel about sodas with cream in them, and truth be told, I'm not wild about almonds either, so how can this be a winner?

This soda comes to us from the Tommyknocker Brewing company in Idaho Springs, Colorado. They brew a couple different creme sodas as well as a line of craft beers. I've never heard of this brewery as they don't seem to distribute in my neck of the woods, but it seems to be pretty popular among the mountain folk. There's even a little story on the bottle: 

   "DISCOVER THE LEGEND. Tommyknockers slipped into the Colorado gold camps with the immigrating Cornish miners during the 1859 rush. These mischiveous elves guided many a fortunate miner to the "Motherlode". (that's how they spell it). Renew the legend - share a Tommyknocker Almond Creme with a friend."

Well the joke's on YOU Tommy, I HAVE NO FRIENDS. BAHAHAHAHA......(single tear)........OK back on track. Let's snap it open and take a whiff.  It smells like a cream soda with a hint of nuttiness to it. How does it taste?

Like a creamy almond. No thanks - I refuse to indulge any more of your motherlode of cream, Tommy. 1.5 out f 5 Santa Hats.  

The 12 Days of POPmas Day 10: Rocket Fizz Black Licorice and Green Apple Jalapeno

Today's a twofer. I decided to try my other two remaining Rocket Fizz sodas in one post for two reasons. One - I already talked about my history with Rocket Fizz and the bottles are pretty minimalistic, so I don't have a ton of new stuff to say except for just cracking the bottles open and trying them. And two - I wasn't sure which one I wanted to try more. So why not both?

First up is black licorice soda. I talked before about how the buttered popcorn jelly belly is perhaps the most polarizing flavor known to man, but now I think I may have to correct myself. Black licorice is definitely a flavor that everyone, whether negative or positive, has a strong opinion about, and I think there's more hate than love for this dark candy concoction. And truthfully, no one I know really has much experience with an actual black licorice; it's always the black jelly beans that are usually left for last or thrown to the seagulls. Even when it came to those sniffable markers (referencing a 12 year old Dane Cook reference here - I'm cool), the licorice one was always the one you gave to the smelly kid who was trying to color with thumb tacks. Personally, I don't mind the taste, and I'm interested to see how it transfers into a soda, so let's give it a shot! I open it up and there's that strong black licorice smell. Reminds me of childhood jellybeans and collegehood jagger bombs. Here goes nothing...I'm actually pretty happy with how mild the flavor is. It doesn't overpower the senses and it's overall pretty drinkable. More like a root beer with a hint of licorice on the back end. I'd give it a 4 out of 5 Santa Hats.

Next is Green Apple Jalapeno. It's just such a weird combination; I don't even really know what to say about it. Besides being green, there's really no relationship between these two foods at all. I've never had anything where they've been put together. I just really gotta try thing; no more yammering on! I open it up an WHOA it smells just like a jalapeno. Not getting any apple though. Let's give it a taste. It's so...weird. It's not at all spicy, but it tastes like a green apple jalapeno. It's like the took out everything that makes a jalapeno spicy, threw in some soda water and green apple Jolly Ranchers and tossed it all in a blender. This is up there with the Jerky soda as one of the most unique flavors I've ever tried, except that it's not God Awful like the jerky soda. This one get a 4.5 out of 5 Santa Hats. I'd revisit this one again!

So of course I did what any 32 year old adult with a Master's Degree would do and decided to pour them both into a glass just for shits and giggles. And...now my tummy hurts...

The 12 Days of POPmas Day 9: Moxie

Hey kid, you got moxie! No, it's not just a compliment you get for doing a good job by an Italian stereotype; it's actually a soft drink. And widely considered to be the first mass-produced carbonated beverage in America! There was a time where you couldn't go into a local soda shoppe or drug store and not see that orange label everywhere. It was so popular that president Calvin Coolidge personally endorsed it. And while its popularity today has pretty much diminished, it still has a cult following in the New England states with Maine even naming it its official soda. 

And much like all of the old-timey sodas invented in the 1800s, it was originated as a nerve tonic and a general "placebo" type drug meant to cure what ailed ya. It even came out in lozenge form to cure whooping cough. It's amazing how all of these sodas we drink today just for the hell of it, originally were considered to have medicinal purposes. I'd kiss my doctor smack on the mouth if he told me the cure to the common cold was to slug a Coke Zero! Moxie is made with the gentian root which is known to help with indigestion, so maybe there is some truth to the claim. Also, in all the research I've done on Moxie, it appears that most people consider it to be pretty bland when compared to the high-fructose corn syrup loaded sodas of today.

Now I've had Moxie once before many years ago. My buddy Andy knew of my affinity for the bizarre and rare sodas and brought one back to me from Vermont. But it's been so long that I can't recall what the taste it, so let's do this. (glug, glug, glug). It's sweeter than the reviews I read on it claimed it to be. To be honest, it's a taste all in its own. It's fruitier than a cola but blander than a Dr. Pepper. The thing I could most compare it to would be a Faygo Rock N' Rye or the short-lived Barqs Cherry Cream Soda...but still not quite. It's unique and by George I like it. This soda has Moxie...and my stomach is already starting to feel better. 4.5 out of 5 Santa hats. 

The 12 Days of POPmas Day 8: Green Tea Low-Cal Soda

OK, so after the last few days of bizarre sodas both tasty and terrible, I need something to settle my stomach. Something that's not based off a candy, nor filled with cream or...meat. Something simple like green tea. Green tea is essentially the modern-day equivalent of the all-purpose tonic (more on that tomorrow); doctors and physicians essentially prescribe green tea for everything from weight loss to hydration to herpes, and it's a pretty inexpensive resource too. You can get a giant can of Arizona Green Tea for a buck at any supermarket. But in all my experiences with green tea, I've never come across a green tea soda. Perhaps because it's counterproductive? Tea is supposed to soothe and heal and pop is supposed to get you addicted to caffeine and rot your teeth. It would be like if Pepsi added Fish Oil to their ingredients and started calling it Pepsi Fish Heart Good Times. But I am curious about this one. It's pretty hard to screw up green tea, and as I look over the ingredients, it does indeed include green tea extract. The "Low-Cal" portion is 60 calories. Which I guess is low when compared to a regular soda, but when Low-Cal is actually a part of your label, you should at least have less calories than a Diet Mountain Dew. Let's see what we're working with here...

I pop it open and there's a rush of carbonation but almost no smell. I know green tea is fairly mild, but I thought I'd smell something. (takes a sip) Another thing I forgot to mention on the label is that it's advertised as "lightly sweetened", and boy oh boy, they're not lying about that! It definitely has a tea aftertaste, but really almost no flavor at all. It really reminds me of if you were taking a Dr. Pepper, which advertises as having a blend of 23 flavors, and taking away 22 of them. It's carbonated, fizzy and bubbly, but lacks any real flavor. Not a bad flavor, just not an exciting flavor. 2.5 out of 5 Santa hats. 

The 12 Days of POPmas Day 7: Beefdrinker Teriyaki Beef Jerkey Soda

I've been sitting on this one for quite some time. I just never knew when the right occasion would be to pop open some meat soda. But now is as good a time as any. This is the Beefdrinker Teriyaki Beef Jerky Soda. Let's take a look at this messed up label first. It looks like the cow just shit out a piece of bee jerky, which really gets me in the mood to drink it! And the bottom of the label states: "For that deep Carnivore Thirst." Is there a such thing as a carnivore thirst? Is this a vampire soda? And if you look close, I mean really close, you can see what may be the most disturbing thing I've ever witnessed on a soda bottle. See if you can catch it...

That's right - farmer Asshole McBlurryface has taken a torture device, STABBED it into old Bessie the cow here, and he's siphoning off her essence of cow right into his soda. And then he's drinking cow-blood soda with a stupid grin on his face, RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE VERY SAME COW! That's messed up, Beefdrinker. 

Also, there's floaties in this one. But upon reading the ingredients, there does not seem to be any actual meat in there. So what's floating around in my bottle? Could it be the yucca exact? The 40g of carbohydrates? Let's be honest here - It's probably congealed cow blood.

Alright well, I crack it open and it smells exactly like beef jerky. That's both a welcoming and terrifying relief all at once. But what does it taste like?

It tastes like sugared teriyaki sauce with meat paste...which is to say, it tastes like the worst thing ever. I would drink 100 creamy melon milk pops before I had another sip of this salty meat sugar water. Going on record to say this is the worst soda I've ever had. -10000 out of 5 Santa hats. Where's my mouth wash?

The 12 Days of POPmas Day 6: Looks Like Orange, Tastes Like Grape

Well...Uhm...It...Ahhhhh... Looks Like Orange....and...uh...Tastes Like Grape...

Goodnight everyone.

The 12 Days of POPmas Day 5: Marshmallow Soda

This next one, and probably a few others down the road comes from Rocket Fizz. This place is the mecca for soda pop nerds like myself. It's a chain store all over the country and they specialize in crazy and obscure sodas as well as making their own flavors. I first came across this place when I was in Nashville last year. I stocked up on a six pack of delicious oddities and was as happy as a pig in shit as I walked through the airport knowing I'd be back home in Illinois in just a few hours where I could taste my crazy concoctions..............And then I was stopped by TSA and told I couldn't bring liquid on the plane. I had to throw them all out. I even suggested she give them to someone as a gift to which she told me that's illegal and proceeded to send me on my way. I can imagine the talk she had with her fellow agents in the break room. "Tina busted a guy for drugs today and I stopped someone with a gun. What about you Terry?" "I stopped a fat kid from trying to smuggle some Buffalo Wing Soda in his backpack..." 

One year later, I learned of a Rocket Fizz store opening near Chicago and I stocked up! This is one of Rocket Fizz's original creations: Marshmallow. The bottle design is very minimalist and I don't have a ton to say about it really, so I'm just going to crack it open and give it a swig.  

Smells, looks and tastes just like a marshmallow. This one is truth in advertising, and I guess I don't have anything too funny or exciting to say about it really. It's called marshmallow and it tastes like marshmallow. 3.5 out of 5 Santa hats. Of all the sodas I've tried so far this week, this one is the most...meh. 

The 12 Days of POPmas Day 4: Melon Creamy Soda

I'm no where near mentally prepared for this. I took a gamble on a few close to expiring sodas, but all were still fairly fresh. This one I KNOW is expired...and may or may not contain cream. Plus it's from Asia, which my track record of Asian beverages has been far from stellar. So this is Melon Creamy Soda. Those three words should never exist in the same state let alone the same beverage. This massive 16.5 ounce aluminum can is declared to be "tasty" and "Quality from UCC." I'm avoiding looking up what the UCC is because I'm guessing it has something to do with squid organs. The Japanese symbols also translate to: "It's tasty and refreshing! Always makes you feel fresh and cool." Don't tell me how to feel, cream melons. A look at the ingredients reveals, oh well great, Evaporated Skimmed Milk. So this is literally a milk pop. A definitely expired milk pop. What the hell am I doing with my life?

I had to pour this one in a glass before I drank it just to see what the texture is.

And there you have it - a carbonated, snot-green, cloudy cream soda. It looks like if Ecto Cooler and a Diner dairy creamer fell into a Soda Stream. Alright, I've stalled long enough - it's time to do this for my millions of made up fans! The first sip tastes like milk. The second sip tastes like spoiled melon someone left out on the surface of the sun. The third sip tastes like a thick, bubbly vanilla shake that has AIDS. 

Nope. That's it. I'm done with this one. 0.5 out of five Santa hats. It only gets a 0.5 because I got to use "milk pop" in a sentence for the first time. I'm going to go lay in the bathtub and reflect on some life choices for the next 18 hours...

The 12 Days of POPmas Day 3: Martian Soda Plum Flavor

Ah the plum, nature's C Minus fruit. Seriously, has there ever been a situation where someone says, "Ok guys, don't panic but, we're out of plums! I know, I know! I checked three stores this morning and they're sold out. Now we do have some ice cream and beer that we can force down until they restock." NO! No one cares about plums. Every time I've ever been offered a plum, my reaction is always, "Uh....yea...I guess." Then about halfway through eating it you're neither satisfied nor upset...plums just kinda exist. They're like Daddy Long Legs - too boring to love, to useless to hate. But it is a well known fruit, and I'm actually fairly surprised I've never come across another plum flavored soda or juice in the past. This is part of the Martian Soda line of pops that specialize in bizarre or rare flavors such as kumquat, marionberry and mulberry. I've actually had the kumquat flavor and even did a video of it, but it was lost to the annals of The Cloud never to be seen again. 

So I crack it open and it smells more like grapes than anything. Although to be honest, it's been at least 104 years since I last had a plum, so what the hell do I know? Alright I'm going in...

I don't hate it. I don't really get "plum" from it, but I guess that's probably a good thing. If anything, it's a lighter in carbonation but sweeter version of Fanta Grape Soda. I thought I'd be PLUMMED out by this (GET IT!!!!!), but I must say I'm pretty impressed overall. Four out of Five Santa Hats. I've made it through three days of teeth rotting, belly busting beverages...nine more to go. 

The 12 Days of POPmas Day 2: Jelly Belly Sour Cherry

Let's keep this holiday choo-choo of exotic sodas chugging along with yet another pop based on a popular candy, Jelly Belly. Part of the reason I'm doing this marathon is fear of these sodas expiring, and as I look at this bottle with no expiration date, I notice a random white film forming around the lip of the bottle. It's probably not safe to drink, but what the hell - I got lots of unused sick days!

Jelly Belly put out a line of "gourmet sodas" including flavors such as Tangerine, Lemon Drop, Strawberry Jam and French Vanilla, but no Buttered Popcorn?!?! That's my all-time favorite flavor of Jelly Bean and it's probably the most polarizing candy in all creation. People either love it or hate it; there's no in between. But think of the marketing value there. You can go to the movies and just get ONE item that has everything. Sparkling soda goodness. Warm buttery favoring. Shame sweats. Someone get Jelly Belly and the patent office on the phone, I have an idea. 

As I tend to do, I went with the most obscure flavor available - Sour Cherry. I know the sour cherry beans taste good, but does the soda do it justice? Let's find out. (smells like a jelly bean so that's a good/terrifying sign right off the bat) But the taste???

Wow! This one lives up to the hype! It's sour. It's cherry. It's bubbly. I can already feel my teeth rotting off from the 42 grams of sugar, but hot damn is this tasty. This one gets a four and a half out of five Santa hats. 

The 12 Days of POPmas Day 1: Astro Pop Soda

Well, when I decided to start writing about obscure sodas again over the summer, I went a little overboard. There's about 40 random sodas around my apartment and some are likely to expire soon. So I figure why not tie it in to the holidays and clean some shelf space with "The 12 Days of POPmas." Each day until Christmas Eve, I'll be doing a mini-review from some of the more random sodas I've purchased over the last six months. So let's get started with day one.

 
To your left is today's beverage of choice: Astro Pop Soda Passion Fruit, and to your right is a photo of an actual Astro Pop. The weird thing is, even though I know Astro Pops exist, I don't know for sure if I've ever had one before. I'm sure I must have at some point but I really couldn't say what an Atro Pop tastes like. Which is also why I went with the most obscure flavor I could find: passion fruit. I really don't know if I could point out what a passion fruit tastes like either. Essentially what I'm saying is, this could taste like goat blood oatmeal (goatmeal?) and I still wouldn't know if it's true to a passion fruit OR an Astro Pop.

The bottle happily tells me that it contains zero calories, invites me to "Enjoy the full Astro Pop experience new in bottles," and informs me that this beverage is "Ultra Sweet: 100% Natural Non GMO." That's a lot of information to take in, and I'm a little bummed because I was looking for at least 40% GMO for my still-growing boyish figure. The nutrition facts shows that while there are 0 grams of sugar, there ARE 9 grams of sugar alcohol? Uh...is this legal? Alright let's give it a whirl.

Lightly carbonated and A LOT less sweet than I anticipated. It tastes kinda like a Wally Warhead once the sour wears off. A nice taste for a sucker but not so much for a soda. I'll give this one two out of five Santa hats.