Rest ye weary deadlights for a spell and let me tell you about a when I recieved a package or RootJack, orange root beer energy , crafted from Cap’n Astrea Valentine to keep her crew healthy and full of vitality. There is a great picture of her on the front, cutlass in one hand, the other resting on the erect cannon she is straddling. And by the look of this fine buxom captain, I be sure there be many a cartoon pirate who would be wishin’ she was striding other things as well! Also, you git to know from a big starbust that there is added vitamin C to ward off the scurvy that comes with months at sea, or like me, the weeks of drinkin bad ale and livin on caffeinated beef jerky.

Jonathan Zook, the founder’s husband, explains the name. “Back in Caribbean pirate times they’d drink out of a wooden mug lined with tar that was called a ‘black jack.’ So we sort of speculated if you were ordering a root beer out of a black jack you might eventually just call it a ‘Root Jack,’ so that’s the name.”
“Internet culture being what it is, there’s a few things that are very popular right now. You have pirates, you have ninjas, and you have zombies… However, a zombie drink just doesn’t sound that appetizing,” Jonathan said.
Taste:8
This drink, how-ver, do sound and taste mighty appetizing, as long as it is as cold as the deep of Davy Jones Locker. As this drink warms, the flavor definitely loses something. so drop this can deep in your sea chest or in the bottom of an icy stream before crackin it open.
While guzzling this down from the bottle is the most fun, bits of foam drizzling down your untended beard, in a civil-like mug it pours a dark brown with a really nice head of foam. On first whiff, I noted lots of strong root beer flavoring, although not as complex as some of the more homemade sodas out there. On my first gulp, I had the best energy root beer flavor – followed by a nice orange finish. I was plenty surprised, as I thought this sliced down G33k Beer, All In Root Beer as well as the XS offering, which were all fine and dandy, but just good enough.

I shared my newfound booty with another mate, a true man o’ the sea. While I am mainly a landlubber, Cap’n Andrew knows what he was doing, and locked aboard 2 flasks of this for his next adventure with the sails. More to follow on his adventures on the seas with it are to come…

But I, being an old salt at root beers and the like, expected more from a small time root beer company. As a soda and not just an energy drink, this was many leagues better than A&W or Barqs, This was not as well put together and complex a root beer as something like Virgils. For an energy drink, however, it put a smile upon this old energy swillers face.

Nutrition:8
RootJack is 100% preservative free, having been bottled through a special process called ‘tunnel pasteurization.’ This kept all the unfortunate soda chemicals to the barest minimum. Still, I was hoping for a try a making thirer own root beer spices, rather than just using a root beer flavoring, but it still works pretty well. I also found the high fructose corn syrup to be unwelcome, as Ill bet this would have also tasted better in a root beer. Even with the HFCS, the drink has 195 calories and 49 grams of sugar in this 12 ounce container, so why not add it up and just use regular cane sugar?

As for the kick, Root Jack has 120 mg of caffeine, plus a bit more from the guarana. Fore I tried any, I was thinkin this would be a weak affair, with barely enough wind in it’s sails to get a youg’en moving, but I was dead wrong. Aft drinking down this grog, I was loaded to the gunwalls for 3 hours time or more. And with all the sugar, expect the high to be strong and powerful, but remember that you be crashin’ in a few hours aft.
Packaging:9

I be loving the wee brown bottle, although I do with it be comin’ in a keg size to help me wash down all this crab. It is as close to a beer as you could get – ad that not be a bad thing, no. The design is rightly a gorgeous offerin’, a mix of hand written fontography and easy to read type. All this with just one orange color printed right non the bottle, not even with those paper labels that are so cheap and peel right off at the first strong wave. the sticky plastic label can even be pulled off and used as a sticker to cover your more ugly beer bottles if you so choose.
The back is also as lovely, although they dont be listing that caffeine content, for some annoying reason or another.
Overall though, this be one mighty fine package!

Until next review, fair winds!