Shirley Temple Taste Test

Recently I noticed a variety of canned and bottled beverages that are called a “Shirley Temple”, or at least are an attempt at that flavor. First I want to give a disclaimer that the person after which the beverages are named, did not appreciate the fact that a kiddie cocktail was named after her. Not that she had a choice, even though it is rather amazing to be famous enough to have anything named after you! She had survived an abusive alcoholic first marriage and was a teetotaler.  I would also like to say that many confuse the ingredients of the original drink. It is not  lemon-lime soda, but ginger ale. It is not cherry but grenadine syrup. The maraschino cherry and slice of lime are the garnish.  And finally, I would add that I cannot remember a time when I was not a fan of this actress. I have collected memorabilia related to Shirley Temple for most of my life. I have her autograph and actually got to meet her in the mid-80’s! Exciting!

The point of this post is to say that my kids and I decided to do a taste test of the current drinks out there. We tasted the following:

• Baseline Standard: An original Shirley temple using ginger- ale and grenadine. 5/5
• Wyler’s Shirley Temple powder 2/5 dropped to 1/5
• Ginger beer with grenadine 2.6/5
• Boylan 2.5/5 increased to 3.2 /5
• Saranac  3/5
• Fitz 4/5 dropped to 2.5/15
• Shirley Temple 7-Up 2.9/5 increased to 3.4/5
• Canada Dry Cherry 4/5
• Slice 2.4/5 increased to 3.8/5
• Bloom 3/5
• Poppi 4.5/5 dropped to 3.9/5
• Ollipop 2.5/5
• Popwell 2.3/5
• Spindrift 1 (red can) – .3/5
• Spindrift 2 (pink can) – .9/5
• Stillers – 4/5 dropped to 3.6/5

I will say that this was done twice – once in Feb. with just 3 of us and then again with all 5 of us in March. The beverages were not refridgerated the first time and the ice watered them down, impacting the overall flavor and fizziness. Additionally, there were too many!! By the end, we were all sick of the sweet flavor.  Originally we judged based on the color, the scent, carbonation, and overall flavor. Thant said, it was fun.

The overall result is that NOTHING beats an original, made-from-scratch Shirley Temple. That was everyone’s favorite. Some were overwhelmingly sweet, fake or flat. Some had too much lemon-lime or cherry and not enough of the ginger and grenadine. A few were almost unpalatable; Avoid Spindrift at all costs!