Mountain Dew White Out

In 2007, Mountain Dew, began a promotion known as DEWmocracy, in which they introduced three limited edition flavor variants for which the general public could vote on becoming a permanent addition to the Mountain Dew family. The campaign was considered a success and so DEWmocracy 2 was released in 2009. Mountain Dew White Out was the winner from the second campaign.

The smell of this soda has the faint hint of grape, and indeed, it has the taste of shaved snow cone ice with that slight grape finish. I don't think it's a bad drink, but the flavor is so lacking to me that it's sort of like drinking unflavored sugar water. I did not partake in DEWmocracy 2, but the other options must have been pretty bad to lose to a flavor that lacks so much flavor.

Mountain Dew

Ally and Barney Hartman, brothers who ran a bottling company in Knoxville, TN, starting making a lithiated lemon-lime mixer for their hard liquor. They called it Mountain Dew after a term used for moonshine. In 1946 they meet Charlie Gordon of Tri-City Beverage at a convention in Gatlinburg, TN and he begins selling Mountain Dew in 1955. By this time the brand was co-owned by Tri-City Beverage and The Tip Corp. In 1960 the original flavor of the drink was altered by adding orange flavoring into mix, more sugar was added to the formula as well. During this period Mountain Dew competed with a similar drink by Pepsi Co. called Teem, but in 1962 Pepsi Co. began licensing Mountain Dew for bottling. Pepsi Co. went on to gain ownership shortly after and has remained under Pepsi Co.'s guardianship ever since.

Seen here are two bottles recently purchased. In 2008, Mountain Dew's name was shortened to simply, Mtn Dew. Although the formula has contained high-fructose corn syrup for many years, Mountain Dew Throwback was introduced in 2009 with sugar replacing the standard corn syrup. Originally, the Throwback variant was intended to be a limited release but has seen multiple short production releases since it's initial introduction. The label also features some of the earlier artwork from the brand.

Mountain Dew has never been massively infused with carbonation, nevertheless it is on par with many large production sodas, particularly those found in plastic bottles which are permeable to air over extended periods of time. Mountain Dew's flavor is a unique blend of citrus flavors with what I believe is lead by grapefruit and touched with others. Interestingly enough, I do pick up a slight difference between the standard offering and the Throwback formula. The real sugar seems to give a smoother edge to the sweetness in the drink, while the regular formula has a hint of acrid sharpness to the sweet flavor. If you can find a bottle of Throwback try a blind taste test yourself and see if you agree?

Vess Pina Colada

For more on the history of Vess, see my earlier post here.

Now to my recollection, I don't think I've ever actually had a true Pina colada. But I expect a least a little hint of coconut since I've made Pina coladas in a bar I used work at. After opening, it certainly carries the scent of coconut with it and a touch of citrus. It's a very sweet and sugary soda, but not strong in flavor. Although very light, I find it to be pretty pleasant. However all these mass market sodas are made with artificial flavors and I just find that drinking a bottle of chemicals instead of real extracts and natural products takes something away from the indulgence of it. Other than that I could see using this as a quick mixer with some booze or simply a light soda for a hot summer afternoon.

Big Red

Grover C. Thomsen and R.H. Roark were chemists for Perfection Barber and Beauty Supply in Waco, Texas when they started making their own flavor extracts. Together, in 1937, they struck out on their own and began selling Sun Tang Red Cream Soda. The name changed to Sun Tang Big Red Cream Soda in 1959, then again to just Big Red ten years later. It was only available regionally, in Central and Southern Texas and around the Louisville, Kentucky and parts of Southern Indiana until the late 1970's. It is currently produced under license by several bottling companies, which include Dr Pepper Snapple Group and the Pepsi Group. Over the years Big Red Inc. has also added some other flavors to their collection, but are usually harder to find. Big Red is iconic enough to have garnered copy cats over the years such as Coca-Cola's Red Flash.

It's odd to ask someone to describe flavors sometimes and that can certainly be said when talking about a red cream soda. Most people have an idea of what cream soda tastes like even without ever having it because they know what "cream" is. But what does a color like red taste like? Once you open a bottle of Big Red, it's smells like bubble-gum. The aroma just pops! It's like a circus in a bottle. The flavor itself comes from a mixture of different citrus oils with vanilla. Big Red isn't as creamy flavored as some of it's imitators. Rather, they focus more on the "red." It definitely is reminiscent of a candy/bubble-gum flavoring yet it isn't. I'm reminded of the time one of my British friends asked me what Root Beer tasted like and the only thing I could say was, "It tastes like root beer." It definitely has a more child-like following. You won't often see adults drinking it outside of Texas and that's probably because most fans of this drink only enjoy it because they liked it as kids. So if you're 6-12 you'll be a big fan. If you're trying it for the first time as a 40-year old, you're likely to be disappointed.

Faygo Pineapple Orange

When I hear "Faygo" I think of my childhood. When I was little, Saturday nights at my house were pizza and movie night. Of course with pizza we had to have some soda. In the 1980's I never saw Faygo sold any other way than individual glass bottles, but it seems there were cans available since the 1960's. You can find it in cans today too, but the glass bottles are gone, replaced with plastic. In those days Kroger carried a pretty good selection of flavors. I usually stuck with grape, strawberry or root beer and those bottles seemed enormous when you're a small kid.

Faygo began in Detroit in 1907 as Feigenson Brothers Bottling Works. Russian brothers and immigrants, Ben and Perry Feigenson started business with just three flavors (strawberry, grape and fruit punch), which were based on family recipes for cake frosting. The Feigenson Brothers shortened their product's name to Faygo in 1921. It's interesting to think about now, but in 1922 they delivered their soda to your door. The business was later handed down to the Feigenson's sons in the 1940's and was later sold to National Beverage Corp in 1987. Today, Faygo produces dozens of different flavors.

The smell of this Pineapple Orange is a little strange. While it's not a strong smell, it's a bit reminiscent of some sort of antiseptic to me. I wasn't expecting too much with this soda since I'm normally not a fan of soda's with mixed fruit flavors. This isn't a terrible flavor, but I think the orange flavoring throws off the pineapple too much. Maybe I'll be able to compare it to their pineapple sometime in the future. Unfortunately, I also think that plastic bottles can affect flavor over time, while glass does not interact with the soda on a chemical level like plastic will. 

Zuberfizz Key Lime Cream Soda

This soda comes from the Durango Soda Company in Colorado. I'm hoping that this will be much better than the Coco Fizz I tried from them in the past. 

It has a very light smell when I open the bottle. For just a moment I thought I smelled a scent of cocoa but that may have been from any cream flavoring added and it dissipated quickly. I find the coloring a bit off putting because it is bright green like mouth wash. It is well carbonated but for some strange reason this leaves my tongue feeling vaguely numbed. This soda has more cream than key lime in it. One of my favorite summer sodas is Stewart's Key Lime, but this drink from Durango falls short of enjoyable for me. 

Vess Whistle Orange Soda

Vess was founded in 1916 by Sylvester "Vess" Jones. Charles L. Grigg was working for Vess when he developed Whistle around 1920. He later left Vess and the Whistle brand with it, he went on to found the Howdy Company and eventually created 7-Up. 

At the time Whistle was the brand name used for their Orange flavor, while the others were branded as Vess. After the stock market crash of 1929, Vess sold the company to Donald Schneebarger and still more flavors were added to the Vess brand line-up. The company was bought by beverage conglomerate, Cott Beverages in 1994. 

Being that the drink has changed hands to a modern bottler and is no longer sold in glass it's hard to say if it is still anything at all like the original drink. This bottle may be old since I found it at a gas station and there was no distinct release of carbonation upon opening. But it's still not bad. The tangy citrous flavor holds up and is not overly sweet and syrupy. Refreshingly cool too for this summer heat. 

©2009 by Ross White

During the heydays of the carbonated beverage St. Louis was a center of activity for many companies, probably helped by the fact that a large industry of beer bottling already existed there. The old Bottling District near the Edward Jones Dome is no longer home to this industry but the name remains. The landmark Vess Bottle can still be found there and plans are in the works for neighborhood redevelopment. 

Red Bull Cola

An Austrian, named Dietrich Mateschitz travelled to Thailand in 1982 and discovered an energy drink named "Krating Daeng", which translated to "Red Bull." He and the owner of Krating Daeng founded Red Bull with the aim to tweak the drink for the European market. The Red Bull energy drink hit the streets in Europe in 1987, but didn't arrive in America until 1997.

The Red Bull energy drink became hugely popular and in 2008, the company introduced Red Bull Cola. I found the aroma quite enticing with a sugary sweet smell. The flavor however, may be a result of the fact that there is no phosphoric acid, preservatives or artificial flavors added. I found it to have a heavy herbal flavor from the natural herbs used but it had nearly no cola flavor. While the drink does the trick in giving you a nice boost of energy, I'd probably drink a regular Red Bull instead if that was my goal. As far as a cola drink goes, I think it falls short.

Fizzy Lizzy Fuji Apple

Fizzy Lizzy has only been around since 2000, so there isn't a rich history yet for me to delve into. They use basic ingredients to make their line up of sodas which has grown to nine flavors. 

On opening, I smell that sharp apple juice acidity, reminiscent of Mott's apple juice. It has real fruit pulp and the taste is true to that of a fuji apple. Though it has a little more bite to it than the fuji apples I normally eat, more like the sharp acid bite that a granny smith apple has. Some of this could be caused by the gases often used in sodas or maybe the lemon juice added. Although "Fizzy" is part of the name, and indeed it is carbonated, it's practically flat compared to the mass market sodas most people are familiar with. It's a tasty apple beverage that would go well with a peanut butter snack... if you're one of those people that dips apple slices in peanut butter. 

Easter Soda

Here's a soda from Grandpa Lundquist... a Easter Soda or Paskmust. Who would have thought I'd find a new soda while visiting Ikea, but I thought it proper to hang on to it for a couple of weeks for Easter. Based on the ingredient label and my prior research on Julmust, I believe this will be roughly the same malt-like flavored beverage bottled for selling at different seasons with new labels. The folks at Grandpa Lundquist also make a spiced winter beverage called Glogg. 

It certainly carries a medicine-like, hoppy aroma and a rich dark color like a stout. This particular incarnation of the drink is far less beer tasting than the Julmust I previously reviewed. It is highly carbonated, perhaps due to the natural brewing involved. After a single tip back, I returned the bottle to an upright position and it quickly over-flowed due to the carbonation. The flavor itself is very unassuming, nearly non-existant, though not quite sure why children would like it. As an annual tradition, it seems more apt, but as something to quench a thirst or merely to wet the palate I find it lacking something.