Brigham’s Brew - 1 Review

I was recently out on tour working for Beach Slang on their tour with Cursive. My responsibilities run the gambit, and one of them is selling merch. Now most bands have tip jars at the merch table that allude to the fact that the tips will be used for drugs and alcohol At our table I have a jar with a sign that reads “Tips for (Root) Beer.” It makes people laugh, and in the instance of our Salt Lake City show it struck up a conversation with a local who hipped me to the fact that Wasatch, a local brewery, made a fantastic root beer. I was told that a nearby grocery store sold it, so as soon as the show was over I hoofed it over to the store and purchased two bottles.

Now it's a well-known fact that Utah has a high Mormon population. It's also pretty widely known that there is a cap to the percentage of alcohol that can be in beer. The people I was on tour with all agreed that it was a terrible thing; the beer tasted different and you just got overly full and felt gross drinking it. Due to these facts I am surprised that there aren't more sodas coming out of the area. Also, speaking of Mormons, this root beer is named after Brigham Young, the second prophet of the religion. That's a whole bunch of weirdness to me. That would be like having a Jesus cola. Actually, I would drink that all day long. Someone get on that. I'm looking in your direction Danny and Real Soda.

Now the laws may forbid the sale of beer that people actually like, but they say nothing about delicious root beer and this is the result. The flavor is full and creamy. The use of honey is always celebrated in my book, and it's inclusion is duly noted by me. I wish it were a bit stronger, but my rule is if you're using honey, go big. Most people probably don't think the same way. Overall the ingredients blend together nicely and the notes of vanilla and wintergreen are distinguishable, and not lost as they are in a generic root beer mix.

At the end of the day two bottles, simply wasn't enough, especially since I was sharing in the van. It's a wonder none of us got sick with all the soda bottles we were passing around all tour. That little box on wheels must have been a germ factory.