I imagine the creation myth of the stuff goes something like this:
Bob: Hey Rob, we need to make a handful of generic soft drink flavors to round out our coffee line. I mean we got all these bottles and labelers and shit, so let's get 'em to use.
Rob: Do we care about taste or quality or anything?
Bob: What'd I say? I said, "Let's round out the line". Get a list of ten soft drink flavors we don't have in development already and get back to me.
two weeks later...
Rob: Here you go, sir, a list of ten new flavors. All written out.
Bob: To make it convenient to the conceit of conversational format, please read them aloud.
Rob: Coca Cola.
Bob: That's a good one, but I think it's claimed.
Rob: Ah. Okay. Cherry. See, I'm doing them in alphabetical order.
Bob: Rob, "Cherry" should come before "Coca Cola" alphabetically. You see, you go to the second letter to determine the order if the first letter is the same.
Rob: Oh, I thought that the second letter would be the "C" in "Cola". I do envy you your liberal arts degree sire. Anyways, I thought we'd make our cherry "natural" or some such thing. People like that nowadays.
Bob: Whatever sells. Next!
Rob: Chamomille.
Bob: I hate to hassle you, but you spelled it wrong.
Rob: What? How can you tell? I said it out loud and you aren't even looking at my paper.
Bob: It's "chamomile". I know it looks wrong but that's it.
Rob: I find this conceit of a written out conversation script thing to be confusing. I don't like it.
Bob: Anyways, chamomile is a stupid soft drink flavor and your a gigantic stupid head for proposing it.
Rob: Sob
Bob: Man up. Next.
Rob: Gassosa.
Bob: No one knows what gassosa is, but it gives fake class to the rest of the line by being all Italiany. Let's do gassosa.
Rob: Iron brew.
Bob: One authentic old country thing is enough. Hey, wait a sec. Why don't we pick something old Country, like Country-Music country, to draw in the cowboy hat people.
Rob: There aren't a lot of those in our distribution area, sir.
Bob: You're thinking small, son. With the sort of money that big manufacturers give the Republicans, cowboy hat people will soon be everywhere. Everywhere.
Rob: As you say, sir.
Bob: Root beer is too kiddyish, though is certainly in the right area. Anyone can make a rootbeer. It's just Root Beer Flavoring Pack 12H and Brown 3. But root beer is for kids, and we make classy adult soda candy.
Rob: How about a whiskey flavored drink, sir?
Bob: That has potential, but gimmee something else.
Rob consults Internet in whispers. Internet gestures wildly.
Rob: Apparently "sarsaparilla" is a cowboy word for a drink similar to root beer.
Bob: That sounds great. Perfect in fact. It'll be cowboy to the cowboy people but the word is weird enough to sound European or Amerindian to the non-cowboy people. Win/win!
Rob: The trouble is, sir, that an authentic tasting sarsaparilla is tricky to make. It has to be spicy but earthy at the same time, sweet and creamy but have bite. It's a root beer, technically, bit it's made from a whole other mess of stuff than what we call "root beer". This is going to take a lot of time and research to blend together a meaningful yet unique mixture which we can sell as "Manhattan Special Sarsaparilla".
Bob: Rob...
Rob: I foresee six months of work. I'd also recommend some research trips, sir, to areas where
people hand craft sarsaparilla at home.
Bob: Robert...
Rob: It will be a rewarding process...
Bob: HEY! Shut up. Listen up genius, you said sarsaparilla is just like root beer...
Rob: Actually, no...
Bob: ...AND we'll make ours out of what we have on hand. Root Beer Flavoring Pack 12H and Brown 3 will do nicely.
Rob: But sir! You are completely missing the point. It's not root beer, it's something else entirely, with a long and rich history...
Bob: FINE! You can add DOUBLE the Brown 3 to make it look dense.
Rob: And some Red 4, sir? Oh please can I add some Red 4?
Bob: Yes, Bob, for you anything.
Rob and Bob hug, curtain falls.
I used my web cam to take this picture,
and had to put the bottle super close to the camera
because it's 10am and I haven't put on any clothes yet.
and had to put the bottle super close to the camera
because it's 10am and I haven't put on any clothes yet.
Okay, to be fair, the ingredients claim there are no artificial colors and it uses natural flavorings and real sugar, but this does not taste like a sarsaparilla to me. Not in the least. It's overcarbonated and tastes like a generic root beer. Or at least the top half of the bottle does as I couldn't bring myself to drink the bottom half.
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