As difficult as it may be to believe, I am a big fan of soda. I'm fairly sure that this is due to my childhood, where I spent my allowance trying to figure out which Faygo soda was the best, or wondering why the heck everyone else liked colas more than Dr. Pepper (and his bastard son, Mr. Pibb).

Growing older however has distanced me from the product. They're simply too sweet for me anymore. Every once in a while, I'll have one with a burger. If the mood strikes me, I'll also pick up a lesser known brand of soda to see how it tastes against the big three (Coke, Pepsi, 7/up-RC Cola). But now that I've decided to reduce the amount of High Fructose Corn Syrup in my life, pop (as it's affectionately referred to in Western Pennsylvania) is almost out of my life for good.

However, I do proudly purchase soda that is free of HFCS, even if only to try it. A friend of mine, knowing this, picked me up a four pack of the latest artisinal soda company to take root here in Seattle, Dry.

Dry is obviously touting themselves as a gourmet soda, with flavors such as Lemongrass, Lavender, Rhubarb and Kumquat. It's made with cane sugar, and a reduced amount of it at that. For this post, I drank that Rhubard Soda.

Look: It passes the look test. It's a fairly thin soda, which goes to show that it's not laden down with sugar, as promised. There's a fair amount of carbonation as well.

Nose: It has virtually no smell.

Taste: It tastes like soda water. Soda water with a hint of some flavor which may or may not be rhubarb. It's only slightly sweet, as expected, and overall, not a soda in the Coca-Cola/7-up vein.

Overall: I understand what they're trying to do with this soda. Their trying to go for the upscale adult market. Think of it as the antithesis of Jones soda (also a Seattle product, by the by). But in my honest opinion, I'd rather have San Pelligrino than this stuff. It's not horrible, but it doesn't taste what it claims to taste like, so much so that it doesn't taste much of anything except soda water. So if I'm going to taste soda water, I'd rather drink some that has some flavor to it. Yes, you read that correctly. I think San Pelligrino has more flavor than Dry soda.

Side note: I'm now thinking of creating a by-line for this site that reads. Accidental Hedonist - Putting things in our mouths, so you don't have to.

UPDATED: Spelling mistakes.