“Third time available in 420 years” as the label reads, Jack Black’s bottle is full of funny extremisms like “Better Dead Red then just  plain Dead!” and “Once you’ve had Jack Black, you’ll never go back!”  Exclamation pointed each time.    Now does its flavor match up with its drama?  The reddish tint holds true to its name and the bouquet has a molasses hint to it.  However, the flavor has a light syrupy essence to it and the bite is modest despite its large sudziness when poured.  Overall, it’s an okay root beer, however I’m afraid the label does resemble to root beer in that it has a large head, but little follow through.

There is still more fun to be had by the bottle however, with cryptic messages on the cap advertising their other beverages, this one in Spanish for some reason “Beba BrainWash… Refrigerante que dá Lingua Azul!”  This means, “Drink Brain Wash… Refrigerate to get a blue tongue!”

Despite its mediocryness (word?)  I’m giving Jack Black’s a 6 out of 10.  Sometimes something just gives you a good feeling 

Zuberfizz has a strong bite to start which I like.  There’s not much of a smell to it but the dark cloudy brown color foreshadows the creamy flavor to come.  The taste is not sharp, but has a smooth creaminess that isn’t too sweet but just right.  Produced by the Durango Soda Company in Durango, CO, they use pure cane sugar, giving it just enough sweetness without being overpowering.  The gum arabic is a natural gum made of hardened sap and is used as a stabilizer and probably what gives the root beer its cloudiness.

All in all, I give Zuberfizz a 7 out of 10 for its creamy goodness.

My sister in law, Vaiva at long last had her second child, this one, a boy. His mystery name (my brother and Vaiva won’t say names until the kid is born) is Lukas Joshua Turner so I approve. His 2 year old sister’s name is Katrina Gabriella Turner so good naming conventions on their part. It’s always hard when someone announces a name and it’s like Havarti Cobblepot Jones and you have to be like, “Oh that’s… different.”

I was working in Seattle this week which is about an hour and a half away from their house so I drove over there last night to see the little tyke. I had come into town earlier and spent a few days hangin out and finally the last couple days Katrina got used to me enough to where I could carry her so that was pretty cool. This little guy, not even a day old yet, could hardly open his eyes, so he had no choice but to let me hold him. He’s really cute; got little godfather jowls and when he cries, he squeaks. Upon breathing in, he makes a squeak toy sound which is hilarious. Oh and yes, as the title suggests, his balls are quite large. They could stay the same size his entire life and still be normal adult sized balls. He’s gonna be a lumberjack! … in the manly way, not the gay way.

It was quite the adventure bringing him into the world too, so I’m told. Apparently, Vaiva was at home when her water broke and she called Joshua, who raced home. They also called Jen Fraks, a family friend to come over and watch Katrina while they went to the hospital. Then they called their Doula. I know what you’re thinking, “What’s a doula?” I had the same response.  Apparently, it’s a kind of midwife sort of thing, but not a midwife, that’s all I know.  Anyway, their doula, Michelle talked to them and said Vaiva was already dilated 7cm and they didn’t have time to make it to the hospital.  So Michelle came over and Joshua got a tarp from the garage to put underneath Vaiva in the living room floor and they had the baby at home.  Pretty crazy huh?  Apparently it was a good birth, although Vaiva still looked exhausted when I got there 20 hours later.  Even Pepper, their dog got in on it by getting to sniff the after birth, nice.

Now my brother has one of each, a boy and a girl, and he says he might be done with the baby having.  I’m just happy to have a healthy nephew and niece and hope to be the fun, cool uncle that everyone should have.

Made with pure Louisiana Can Sugar, Abita is not too sweet, but just right, and definitely not syrupy.  It’s light brown color and moderate fizz give you a slight bite to accompany it’s moderately rich flavor.  Even the smell is subtle.  “Mild” seems too cruel a word to describe this root beer, so I would call it genial; perfect for the masses, but not nearly strong enough for the root beer connoisseur.

Overall, I’ll give it a 6 out of 10. Although I would give it extra marks for having no additives or preservatives.  That’s quite a feat! Pretty much every other root beer has sodium benzoate in it as a preservative.  Sodium benzoate is bacteriostatic and fungistatic under acidic conditions (in this case carbonic acid), meaning it keeps fungus and bacteria from growing.  While sodium benzoate is on the whole harmless, there is research that shows it may be unhealthy in certain conditions or large amounts.  For instance, in combination with ascorbic acid (vitamin C, E300), sodium benzoate may form benzene, a known carcinogen. Heat, light and shelf life can affect the rate at which benzene is formed.  But if you simply don’t drink OJ with your root beer, this won’t be an issue.  Bleh, get chills just thinking about mixing the two.

However, some claim that sodium benzoate by itself can damage and inactivate vital parts of DNA in a cell’s mitochondria, which is the energy producing powerhouse of the cell.  So again kudos to Abita Root Beer for nixing the preservatives.

The first thing you notice about Sparky’s Fresh Draft Root Beer is not the smell, which is actually very slight, but the loud fizz of the super carbonation of this delectable beverage.  It’s uniform blondness pours clearly and creates an immediate and ferocious head.  Pouring it into your mouth, you feel the sharp bite tickle your tongue.  It’s just enough to invigorate you but not overdone to the point where you taste the carbonation.

The taste itself is pure root beer flavor.  The mysterious “spices” in this root beer hold the key to the nigh perfect root beer.  I think the addition of honey gives it a sweet taste without being syrupy or overpowering.  For those naturalists out there, Sparky’s uses pure cane sugar, no artificial ingredients, and has a kick ass sassafras taste.  Definitely a high recommendation on my list.  However, since I’m an optimist, I’m gonna hope for even better things along the way, so I’m going to give Sparky’s an 8 out of 10, although it may perhaps be a grade below what it deserves.

Well I’ve gone and done it.

I registered for the Austin Marathon taking place on Feb 14th, that’s right, Valentine’s Day, talk about inconvenient.  On that day I shall run 26.2 miles in hopefully under 6 hours.  If I do that, then I can cross it off my list.  Even though I didn’t meet my distance marker of 15 miles by December, I decided to go ahead and fork over the $130 DOLLARS! it takes to register.  That’s pretty freakin expensive for me to run so far.  “Oh yes please I’d love to run until I piss blood, but I can I pay for it too, that would really be lovely.  Shall I bend over again?”

Apparently you do get a chip which marks your exact times and i think you can track me on the website live.  Plus a t shirt and a medal.  Totally worth the money…right?

I really wanna do this BECAUSE it’s so difficult.  The running is taxing me more mentally then physically.  I’ve decided that it’s really difficult for me to run for long periods of time and this cold weather is not helping me WANT to go outside and run.  So Im just gonna run short distances, max of 10 miles and then just bust the whole thing out the day of.  I’m hoping the energy of the thousands of people around me will energize to the finish line.  Plus all I have to do is keep a steady pace of 12min miles, which is pretty easy to do.  In the mean time, I’ll just keep up the running, committing to a total of 10 miles a week at least.  wish me luck.

Drive-in Style Dog n Suds Root Beer starts off with a nice robust root beer bouquet.  You can almost taste the root beer by smelling  it.  When poured, it is a clear amber color, lightly carbonated.  Dog n Suds brought back memories for my dad growing up in Arkansas when he would go down to the drive in or soda shop and enjoy the fizzy beverage with a hot dog.  Although he said Dog n Suds hot dogs were delicious, he was never too impressed with their root beer and I’m going to have to agree.  The smell of the root beer seems to be its best trait.  Much like Burger King fanning their artificial hamburger scent from its drive in, Dog n Suds Root Beer does the same thing. It calls you in with fragrance, but lets you down with its light flavor and syrupy taste.  Furthermore, the bite of this dog is nothing to be afraid of; a very tame root beer to say the least.

Over all, I give Dog n Suds Root Beer a 5 out of 10.

Upon further examination, the inclusion of High Fructose Corn Syrup to its ingredients would explain the syrupiness.  Although its 30g of sugar might seem like a lot to some, it’s mild in comparison with where we’re going on this root beer journey.  We’re off to a rough start, but there’s plenty more where that came from.

Another year of life gone by.  Has it been a good one?  Did I do it right?  Will I look back in the future and say, “yeah, that was a good year”?  I think so.  Let’s see what happened over this year… but first!  New Years resolutions.

For 2010, I’m not resolving to do much cause I’ve already got so many other things on my list. But two additions are these:
1.) I resolve to play at least one round of golf.  Dianne and I went to a golfing range in LA and it was a lot of fun, so I’d like to try it out on the real deal.
2.) Eat one salad item ever day, every other week.  This means, the first week, I don’t have to, but the next week, I have to have a salad every day for that week.  Then the next week I don’t have to but still can if I want.  The reason I’m doing this is because the food experiment I did last year was not enough.  The affects of it lasted a few months and then I started eating less veges again.  I don’t think I eat unhealthily, but it’s always good to keep things like this in check before a problem actually arises.  So, it’s a resolution.

As for last year, I started out the year in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; not a bad place to start it out.  I had many adventures all over southeast Asia, and even got some snowboarding in when I came home in Tahoe, Park City, and others.  Saw some great bands at both Austin South by Southwest and Austin City Limits in October; not to mention the mudfest ACL became.  I journeyed to Australia to see what’s downunder and saw a croc jump up out of the water.  I met some fun people and dated some very interesting women.  I started a company called Happy Ugg Boots with one of them. I am now in what is the longest serious relationship I’ve had for quite some time: over 3 months now! with a girl named Rosario who I met a few years back at a friends party.  She’s a lot of fun to hang around.

I went to Vegas several times, twice with Rosario and saw some amazing Circ de Soleil shows.  As far as gambling goes, I think I evened out over the year, so no big money there.  I did a show on stage called Mortified: two nights the first time and once in the Alamo Ritz theater downtown, which was awesome! Even got a tv spot live on the Austin Eye.

I only worked 30 weeks out of the year for my travel job which left a lot of time open to travel for fun, hang with friends, and visit my parents which I’ve done a lot of this year; plus I got to see my grandma, aunt and uncles over Christmas which was great!  I’ll prolly have to work more in 2010 though as the paycheck for 30 weeks is not quite up to par for my bank account.  Done a lot of wakeboarding this year and learned how to switch goofy and do an air 180.

Saw some plays in the first half of the year and got to know some of the theatre crowd in Austin but not nearly well enough.  Would love to do more with them.  Had visitors come in from out of town, including Didi from Holland, and Law from LA who was here for SXSW and the documentary he worked on along with three brothers won best overall!  Which is awesome!  I donated blood for the first time EVER and will continue to do it once a quarter, but not in winter.  Found out my blood type is A+, which means I shouldn’t eat much red meat and that’s fine by me, not a steak man.

My parents are doing well in their new house and were able to sell the old one this year.  So having all that new money meant a shopping spree of new furniture and other items.  Guess who has two thumbs and gets the old furniture.  THIS GUY!  My brother and his family are also doing well.  Joshua will be around more in 2010 to see Katrina grow up (they’re poddy training right now), and Vaiva’s got a little boy in the oven.  Timer goes off in a few weeks!

I love Austin and my friends here, but still miss my LA friends.  No man knows any greater friends then those.  I always knew I had found some diamonds in the rough and am often jealous of their activities together and longing to join them… then I go rock climbing and try to be happy with where I am at, or think of ways to make trips over.

As far as status quo, both houses are holding up and retain tenants, although this next year will be a big change for the northern house as I’m going to start renting it per room.  Hope that works out, otherwise I’m hosed.  So here’s to the New Year, may it not be a year of hosing!

Before we jump into the tastings of root beer.  We’ve got to know a little more about its making and what we’re looking for in a flavor.  Root beer was originally brewed using sassafras root.  This same root can be filed down to a powder and is put in many gumbos as a spice.  Sassafras can also be steeped into a tea until the FDA banned sassafras in cooking oils and foods in 1960, siting lab reports that claimed ingesting it led to liver damage and certain types of cancers.  Of course today, they’re more then happy to let us ingest high fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated oils, but let’s not get off topic.

After 1960, soda companies were forced to switch over to artificial sassafras flavorings and spices to recreate their flavors, that is until 1994 when the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act was passed, eventually lifting the ban on sassafras use in foods.  Today, most root beers are still made with artificial flavorings along with some of these ingredients:

• Pimenta dioica – Allspice
• Vanilla planifolia – Vanilla
• Trigonella foenum-graecum – Fenugreek
• Myroxylon balsamum – “Tolu Balsam”
• Abies balsamea – “Balsam Fir”
• Hordeum vulgare – “Barley” (Malted)
• Myristica fragrans – Nutmeg
• Juniperus communis – “Juniper” (fruit or “berry”)
• Cinnamomum zeylanicum – Cinnamon (bark)
• Cinnamomum aromaticum – “Cassia” (bark)
• Syzygium aromaticum – Clove
• Foeniculum vulgare – Fennel (seed)
• Zingiber officinale – Ginger (root)
• Illicium verum – Star Anise
• Pimpinella anisum – Anise
• Humulus lupulus – Hops
• Mentha species – Mint
• Hypericum perforatum – St. John’s Wort
• Cane Sugar
• Molasses
• Honey

Most of which will be hidden under the clandestine “spices” label in the ingredients section to secure each maker’s secret recipe is not revealed.

Each brand has its own history to their specific root beer, but to North America, root beer was invented by Charles Hires, a Philadelphia pharmacist who according to his biography discovered a recipe for a delicious herbal tea while on his honeymoon. The pharmacist began selling a dry version of the tea mixture and also began working on a liquid version of the same tea. The result of was a combination of over twenty-five herbs, berries and roots that Charles Hires used to flavor a carbonated soda water drink. The Charles Hires’ version of a root beer beverage was first introduced to the public at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial exhibition. The Hires family continued to manufacture root beer and in 1893 first sold and distributed bottled root beer. Charles Hires and his family certainly contributed greatly to the popularity of modern root beer, however, the origins of root beer can be traced further back in history.

The historical root beer was analogous to small beer, in that the process provided a drink with a very low alcohol content. In spite of roots being used as the source of many soft drinks in many countries throughout the world (and even alcoholic beverages/beers), the name root beer is almost unused outside of the United States, Canada and the Philippines. Most other countries have their own indigenous versions of root-based beverages and small beers but with different names and branding.

December 4 is International Root Beer Day (IRBD). IRBD was first celebrated on December 4, 1995 in Venezuela with American root beer imported from Curaçao.

Alright kiddies, that’s enough background on the beer of root, let’s get fizzin!

Happy New Year everyone!

For Christmas I got 24 bottles of different types of rootbeer from my parents!

And so of course I must blog about them as I try each one.  You may be wondering “Why would someone buy a case load of rootbeer for someone?”  Well you inquisitive reader you, if you’ve seen my list of 101 things to do in 1001 days, you’d know that I want to taste test 12 different types of rootbeer, now I have 24! And by the end of all this, you too shall know which rootbeer is truly the best.

I’ll be rating based on taste, bite, color, smell, and overall rootbeeriness.  I’ll give an overall rating from 1 to 10, but I’m a harsh judge, so 10 would have to be the best frikkin rootbeer I’ve ever tasted.

So stay tuned for every Mon and Wed for a new rootbeer update!