Grape soda is firmly planted in my subconscious as the most fake of the cheap sodas in the grocery store. I drank my fair share growing up, but at a certain point you wonder if the flavor engineers responsible for the generic brands have actually ever seen a real grape? I picture a room full of lab coated mutants who have never seen a piece of fruit in the wild deciding what the color purple tastes like. Honestly, I still kind of like the fake grape sodas, but seeing a grape variety of Sprecher was much more exciting.
This isn’t just grape soda, it’s Concord grape soda with Wisconsin honey. And it’s incredible. The grape flavor is rich and deep with a pronounced antioxidant feel. The honey adds to the depth and gives it a bit of a floral quality. Like other Sprecher sodas this is advertised on the label as being fire-brewed. I still don’t know what impact that might have on the final product verses and electric heating process, but it certainly sounds good. This grape sodas was delicious on its own but I wish I had another bottle to try it with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.
My enjoyment of the beverage is slightly tempered by my concern for the gorilla on the label. Is this how the grapes are harvested? If so, I have two questions. Is it sanitary for gorillas to pick grapes with their feet? Also, is the grape vineyard OSHA compliant? The grape vine the gorilla is hanging from appears way too thin to support a primate of his size. I refuse to drink any beverage produced using inhumane gorilla work conditions.
While I liked it I could see how others wouldn’t. Grape flavored anything, especially something sweetened like a soda, could remind people of grape flavored medicine. That’s probably not a pleasant trigger and I can appreciate a natural aversion to the flavor. That didn’t bother me, and I’d gladly drink it again. Grape is not my favorite flavor of fruit sodas, but this still gets a 7.9 out of 10 on my rating scale.
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Catalog:
Sampled June 2017. Purchased at Rocket Fizz in Seattle. To see other Rocket Fizz sourced reviews, click here.
The Sodafry 