Oogave

The Pooj has loot in the boot.

(BevMo Pasadena, April 2011)

Agave nectar is all the rage right now as an alternative sweetener. Farmed from the agave plant (variations of which are also used to make tequila), the syrup has lower glucose levels than typical sugar as well as fewer calories. Its honey-like consistency also makes it a viable sugar substitute for cooking, mixing into drinks, or simply out of the bottle as pancake syrup. However, the jury is still out on agave nectar’s relative health benefits – the decrease in glucose comes with an overwhelming increase in fructose levels that make it 1-1/2 times sweeter than table sugar (sucrose) and, ironically, given its marketing as a healthy sugar alternative, may in fact render agave nectar just as (un)healthy as we would typically consider HFCS.

But who are we kidding, right? I’m writing this, and presumably you’re reading this, because we drink lots of root beer with cavalier disregard for its potential health foibles. That in mind, on with the show…

Without harping on the debated health benefits of agave nectar, it’s worth noting that Oogave got its start because a natural food restaurateur from Denver decided that serving processed, commercial, HFCS-filled soda at his establishment would be counter to his purpose in opening it to begin with. But because his patrons repeatedly requested soda with their meals, Stephen Anson did the next best thing and started making his own sodas in a variety of creative flavors like watermelon and grapefruit. Anson began to notice that people were coming into his shop for sodas as much as they were coming in for food, so in 2007 he closed the restaurant, bought some production and bottling equipment, and set out full time as a beverage maker.

It’s a great story, so I really want to like the end product. Upon an initial sniff and a subsequent sip, I am glad to report that it doesn’t taste like it smells, because it kind of smells like a urinal cake… Granted, I don’t know what a urinal cake tastes like, but I’m not really planning on doing any more research into that, so let’s just leave that one where it is. As far as whether I would consider it root beer – not at all, really. Oogave’s website says it has “notes of sarsaparilla, vanilla, and horehound,” which sounds like some nice notes, but those notes are played at an extreme pianissimo. More than anything, it comes off as thin and sweet, with only a slight root-y essence rather than an actual root-y flavor.

Relative lack of root beer credentials aside though, Oogave is actually pleasantly light and refreshing. I’d imagine the watermelon and grapefruit varieties (or the strawberry rhubarb, which I actually want to go find now…) would be better suited for such accolades than bold and rich root beer should be. Oogave Root Beer then, gets only a 1.5.