Root Beer

So I miss lots of thing from the States.

One of them is root beer. Luckily, one of Jordan's friends sent him about 4 packages of root beer concentrate, so we're set until we go home. And in cases of emergency, you can buy root beer and cream soda at KaDeWe, but it costs like an arm and a leg. Per can.

Anyway, Jordan and I were invited to a party tonight. We advertised that we would bring root beer, following the nice German tradition of bringing things to parties. Usually, Germans just bring beer to parties, but it goes against our groove.

Unfortunately, Germany protects the safety of the general public by enforcing a country-wide ban on dry ice. Actually, we've received mixed results on our survey about whether you can buy dry ice here; however, even those who insist that "This is Germany. It's civilization. Not Nebraska. Of course we have dry ice." can't give us any leads on where it can be purchased.

Fortunately for root beer connoisseurs, Germany also protects the health of the general public by encouraging them to drink a metallic-tasting carbonated water substance. Hereafter, metal water.

Studies have shown that drinking metal water from birth increases the mathematics aptitude scores of males aged 12-15 years old.

And nothing is as refreshing after a hard game of soccer as stepping off the field, plopping down on the bench, and taking a swig of bubbly metal water.

It's like drinking Sprite. Without the harmful sugars and artificial flavors.

It's like a spoonful of ice cream in liquid form. Except it tastes more like spoon than ice cream.

It's like licking rocks. Except without having to bend down.

And it's an essential ingredient for home-brew root beer in countries where dried ice is banned.

So on the way to the party, I picked up two bottles of metal water at the store. There are three degrees of carbonation in metal water: still, medium, and classic. The most-carbonated is the classic variety. I picked up two bottles of classic and ran to the Sbahn stop just in time to miss the train out... shoot.

Unfortunately, the powers of metal water are helpless when pitted against the punctuality of the German train system.

After dumping a fair amount of sugar into the classic metal water, we added root beer extract, and wondered how to mix the concoction. A helpful German (who didn't drink root beer) helped us by grabbing the bottle, and shaking it. Hm... no longer classic.

I suggested that we only make one bottle of root beer, and leave the other for later. We could make more root beer if people drank the first bottle.

We got mixed reactions from the initial bottle of root beer. Some said it was too sweet. Others said it was not sweet enough. And most agreed that it didn't have enough carbonation. Shoot.

Anyway, we had a fun evening.

When I returned to the kitchen where the drinks were, I had to smile. The Germans hadn't touched half of the root beer. The bottle was still half-full.

However, the Germans had had no problem with drinking the entire other bottle of metal water.

Classic.