Maine Root Blueberry Soda

Maine Root produces sodas using certified Fair Trade produced cane sugar from Brazil. The company is based in Portland, Maine and began producing root beer in 2000. The blueberry scent from the top of this bottle is very strong. It's as if someone bought a container of fresh blueberries at the market then crushed them and stuck it in my face. The taste is equally strong. The odd blueberry with some other fresh fruits, with pancakes, or baked into a muffin is great but this is very powerful. I feel like this should be served with a muffin for breakfast. It's not quite my cup of tea, but I'm sure some folks will enjoy it. 

Fanta ? Zero Sugar #WhatTheFanta

One more for the Fanta fans. All cards on the table, I picked up this bottle just before last Halloween, hence the label design, but had forgotten it in the fridge. I would hope that it would be a different flavor than the last 'Fanta ?' I reviewed, but they can pretty much color them however they like without affecting the taste so who knows. Regardless of the flavor, this one is different in that it is the zero sugar sort, so even if they've flavored them alike they'll probably be a difference simply because the sweeteners they use affect the taste too. Let's open it up and see what this one's all about then.

It has a faint blueberry-like smell and although it looks positively black, when I pour a bit out, it's a very, very dark blue. Still plenty of carbonation in it. It's easy to tell that it's a zero sugar drink due to that chemical-like change you get from the flavor. The same quality found in zero sugar Canada Dry Ginger Ale. This is the very reason I don't care for the drinks labeled "zero" or "zero sugar". I usually find drinks labeled "diet" more enjoyable. As for the berry flavoring, I'd describe it as a sort of mixed-berry flavor, but heavy on darker berries like blueberry and blackberry. If it used high-fructose corn syrup or cane sugar it would be more likeable in my opinion.

Okc Soda Blueberry Acai

It's been a long time since I passed through Oklahoma City, but on my most recent visit to Kansas City I found this can from Okc Soda Co. Founded in late 2019 by three guys from the beer brewing business, Michael Crowder, Mike Noonan, and Pat Krencicki, had a desire to create sodas with more whimsical flavors. You'll note on the labeling that these have no high fructose corn syrup (they use cane sugar), no caffeine, and reverse osmosis filtered water. They have some flavors you might expect, such as root beer, lemon-lime, and orange cream... but what interests me is some of their more unique options, like strawberry shortcake and this can of blueberry acai. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find other flavors at the shop where I found this, which I note for some transparency because I've not found blueberry sodas to be very good in the past. Maybe this one will surprise me, but I do hope to hunt down some of their other flavors in the near future on some of my trips. 

There isn't a massive release of carbonation when opening the can, but there is a strong blueberry aroma that reminds me of fresh blueberries in my cereal. Pouring out a little to get a sense of the carbonation and color, it has more of a slight blue tint instead of a disturbing dark color. I can't recall actually ever eating acai berries, but I enjoy blueberries fresh, in waffles, yogurt, etc. I can say that the taste is very true to the flavor of blueberries. It isn't overly sweetened like some brands that end up tasting like candy, which probably is partially owed to the use of cane sugar over HFCs. As I've mentioned before I find that using cane sugar gives a softer sweetness. So I am pleasantly surprised that to have found a delightful blueberry soda. 

Mountain Dew Dew.S.A

 

This Dew.S.A flavor, was a sort of summer celebration flavor marketed as a mix of three of their spin off flavors, namely Code Red, White Out, and Voltage... a blend of red, white, and blue. 

This blended drink turns out to have a berry-like smell, while the purple color makes you think more along the lines of a grape. The actual taste does feel like a mix of the mentioned flavors rather than a totally new drink. I might even imagine if a kid at a soda fountain filled their cup with each of those it would probably taste a lot like this. I was struggling for a bit with how to describe this but I think the best way to explain this flavor is like if you had a blueberry and raspberry sno-cone and drank the last of the syrup at the bottom of the cone, very sugary. 

Aaaannnndd... now I'm seeing that I actually posted about this flavor once before. Reviewing my previous post is interesting because I think I came about pretty much the same conclusion each time. I'll try not to make this mistake again. 

Flathead Lake Blueberry Pomegranate

Flathead Lake Gourmet Soda is a line with several flavors produced by the North American Beverage Company. NAB has only been around since 1993 so there's not much more to share. They also produce a chocolate mousse drink, strawberry milk, as well as bottled cappuccino and chai teas.

This bottle smells like the old cough syrup, Dimetapp. The mixture of scents tried to conceal the pomegranate, but isn't necessarily that of blueberry. It's very lightly carbonated. The flavor is quite a strange mixture and does indeed taste like a sort of medicine to me. It tastes of several berry flavors, including blueberry and cranberry and the pomegranate finally shows up in the after-taste. I'm going to have to suggest passing on this.