For quite a while I thought “root beer” to be a fictitious beverage, like Romulan Ale or Bloodwine.

Until I stumbled upon some comments by Americans mentioning it to be a real thing!

Only problem was that it is basically unknown and very hard to find here in Germany.
After unsuccessfully trying two special US stores as well as a couple of Asia markets (after someone mentioned that it is also a thing in some Asian countries) I basically gave up.

So imagine my excitement when accidentally coming upon this can in my local Edeka market (a type of German higher end grocery store)!

Now I and my kids are ready to try it, but this should naturally be with the right background.

So: Which Star Trek episode that references it should we watch while tasting it?
We are currently watching TNG, so this would be preferred (if it even appears in there?).
I would even be ok with a Wesley centered episode… ;-)

Update:

First, thanks to you all for the suggestions! In the end we went with DS9’s “Little green men”, as other episodes would have required too much contextual knowledge (and are also much darker).

Individually perceived tastes of the Root beer varied somewhere between toothpaste and decomposed rubber.

Final verdict has been mixed:
My daughter completely hates it, my wife is not especially fond of it, I kinda like it and my son now has a new favorite soft drink :-)

  • ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com
    81·
    7 months ago

    OP I don’t want to spoil your good time, but you deserve to know, not all root beer is the same!

    I do not know this brand, but the line between “bad” root beer and “good” root beer seems to be clearly split by a single ingredient: “Bad” contains high fructose corn syrup, “good” contains pure cane sugar. You should be able to check the ingredients on the can, and most with pure cane sugar proudly declare it on the front of the label (which makes me worried this one may not) and they typically use glass bottles. They are more expensive but are so worth it.

    I say that to say this: If you try it and don’t like it, and it does have HFCS, try it one more time but with the pure cane sugar, it really makes all the difference. My brand is IBC Root Beer, idk if you can find it or get it shipped to DE but I really won’t drink many other brands tbh, Boylan is good too. Both are on Amazon, but I understand the hesitation there, and idk if they ship to DE.

    That said, also, traditionally it was made with Sassafras oil, which was banned by the FDA in the 1960s, so I’ve never had the real kind either and we never will, pure cane is the best we can do T_T

    • Multiplexer@discuss.tchncs.deOP
      5·
      7 months ago

      High fructose corn syrup is thankfully not a thing here in Europe.
      So no domestic German soft drinks use it and also almost all of the American soft drinks I have seen so far contain normal sugar (probably not made from sugar canes, though, but doesn’t really matter), the root beer in the picture included! :-)
      We will try it during our relaxed evening TV session, so I will be able to tell more in about two hours or so…!