The Sweet Taste of Victory

Despite the Seahawks decision to lay down on national television last night and lose to the previously winless team from New Orleans (no, it hasn't changed it's name to K-Ville, by the way), that didn't stop us from tasting Sweet Victory. But we did have to taste some Field Turf and Perspiration along the way.

Why the Initial Caps, you wonder? Because those were the flavors of the limited edition sodas available for sampling by the Jones Soda Company before the game. Qwest Field, home of the Seahawks, is the only stadium in the NFL or MLB to have given the boot to Coca-Cola and Pepsi as the exclusive softdrink provider and gone with Seattle-based independent soda maker, Jones Soda Co -- the company with the black & white photos on the bottles you see in grocery stores and convenience marts. They've recently switched to making all of their drinks from pure sugar cane, so they tend to be a bit sweeter than normal, but they're very good.

Unless you're drinking Perspiration, that is. Jones has a tradition of making some rather questionable flavors of soda each year in time for Thanksgiving. In fact, they make up flavors that taste like Turkey & Gravy, Sweet Potato, Dinner Rolls, Peas, and Antacid. You know, basically all the tastes that comprise our national day of gluttony. But, to celebrate their partnership with the Seahawks, they also created a special package of football-themed flavors including: Perspiration, Field Turf, Dirt, Sports Cream, and Sweet Victory. And they all taste exactly like the name they're given, I assure you.

Kristin tried the Sports Cream flavor, thought it disgusting, and quickly took a sip of the Sweet Victory I was handed as a chaser. Yes, the guy who gave me the miniature cup of Perspiration soda said I would need a chaser. He was right. Kristin managed to actually swallow her sip of sweat-juice, but I spit mine out on the spot. This may be the only soda in the history of the softdrink wars where the guys out there hawking it expect you to spit it out. It was disgusting. It tasted exactly like sweat. Fresh sweat, too, not that sweat that spends a few months locked in the pads of your bike helmet and then finally drips down on a hot summer day. So it lacked the earthy aftertaste I'm familliar with, but it was disgusting nonetheless. In comparision, the Field Turf flavor which tasted like a bag of lawn clippings mixed with plastic wasn't nearly as bad. Sweet Victory is excellent though. Almost like a berry-flavored cream soda, but refreshing. Or maybe it was awful too and my taste buds were in denial from drinking the others, I don't know.

Fortunately, those flavors aren't available at the concession stands in the stadium. There, they sell their excellent takes on standard soda flavors, with each bottle featuring a photo of a different Seahawk player. But the photo on the bottle could be you. Jones Soda is best known for the black & white photos that grace their bottles of soda and for as long as I can remember, they've had a program that allows you to upload a photo and order a special case of soda with your photo on it. In what may be one of the better marketing ideas I've seen yet (not quite on the level of turning 7-11's into Kwik-E-Marts, but close) they sent professional photographers throughout the stadium to take photos of everyone for soda bottles. We were then handed a business card with a website and info on ordering our own special case of gameday Seahawks soda. I'm going to hope they come back again next week because I was yelling at the field during the photo and ruined the photo. Oh well...

Here's a list of other flavors Jones is currently concocting. It's interesting that Jamaican Ginger Ale is one of the flavors as I just learned in "Water for Elephants" last night that nearly 100,000 people became paralyzed from drinking tainted batches of the stuff during the depression. Lets hope nobody else draws that connection, else they might have better luck selling sweat.