Virgil's Root Beer is a brand of

root beer Root beer is a sweet North American soft drink traditionally made using the root bark of the sassafras tree ''Sassafras albidum'' or the vine of ''Smilax ornata'' (known as sarsaparilla, also used to make a soft drink, Sarsaparilla (soft drink ...

that originated in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. The root beer was first created in 1994 by Edward Crowley and Jill Fraser Crowley, owners of Crowley Beverage Co.

Flavors

Virgil's Root Beer contains a blend of spices that includes

anise Anise (; '), also called aniseed or rarely anix is a flowering plant in the family Apiaceae native to Eurasia. The flavor and aroma of its seeds have similarities with some other spices and herbs, such as star anise, fennel, licorice, and ta ...

licorice Liquorice (British English) or licorice (American English) ( ; also ) is the common name of ''Glycyrrhiza glabra'', a flowering plant of the bean family Fabaceae, from the root of which a sweet, aromatic flavouring can be extracted. The liq ...

vanilla Vanilla is a spice derived from orchids of the genus ''Vanilla (genus), Vanilla'', primarily obtained from pods of the Mexican species, flat-leaved vanilla (''Vanilla planifolia, V. planifolia''). Pollination is required to make the p ...

cinnamon Cinnamon is a spice obtained from the inner bark of several tree species from the genus ''Cinnamomum''. Cinnamon is used mainly as an aromatic condiment and flavouring additive in a wide variety of cuisines, sweet and savoury dishes, breakfa ...

clove Cloves are the aromatic flower buds of a tree in the family Myrtaceae, ''Syzygium aromaticum'' (). They are native to the Maluku Islands (or Moluccas) in Indonesia, and are commonly used as a spice, flavoring or fragrance in consumer products, ...

nutmeg Nutmeg is the seed or ground spice of several species of the genus ''Myristica''. ''Myristica fragrans'' (fragrant nutmeg or true nutmeg) is a dark-leaved evergreen tree cultivated for two spices derived from its fruit: nutmeg, from its seed, an ...

wintergreen Wintergreen is a group of aromatic plants. The term "wintergreen" once commonly referred to plants that remain green (continue photosynthesis) throughout the winter. The term "evergreen" is now more commonly used for this characteristic. Mos ...

cassia oil ''Cinnamomum cassia'', called Chinese cassia or Chinese cinnamon, is an evergreen tree originating in southern China, and widely cultivated there and elsewhere in South and Southeast Asia (India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam) ...

, pimento berry oil, and

balsam oil Balsam of Peru or Peru balsam, also known and marketed by many other names, is a balsam derived from a tree known as ''Myroxylon balsamum'' var. ''pereirae''; it is found in El Salvador, where it is an endemic species. Balsam of Peru is used i ...

. In 1999, Virgil's expanded its product line to include vanilla cream, black cherry, orange, lemon-lime and cola flavors. In 2018, they added a new line of zero-sugar products based on a sweetener blend containing

erythritol Erythritol is an organic compound, a four-carbon sugar alcohol (or polyol) with no optical activity, used as a food additive and sugar substitute. It is naturally occurring. It can be made from corn using enzymes and fermentation. Its formula i ...

stevia Stevia () is a natural sweetener and sugar substitute derived from the leaves of the plant species ''Stevia rebaudiana'', native to Paraguay and Brazil. The active compounds are steviol glycosides (mainly stevioside and rebaudioside), which h ...

and monkfruit.

References

American soft drinks Root beer 1994 introductions {{soft-drink-stub