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My Father was from Connecticut and I'm a pretty good mix of Eastern European and Scottish/American Mutt anchestry, so I know what you mean about the various groups in the NorthEast.

What is Moxie? You mentioned it but is it a soft drink or something more like yoohoo? I have never heard of it before. And I am laughing at you thinking Lone Star beer is the face of Texas. It is considered very low cost swill here - something you would find bums on the street drinking, not even considered in the cheaper beer variety - more like a joke beer. Coors or Budweiser is higher on the food chain than Lone Star here. lol Shiner is good - locally brewed and quickly spreading into other States - if you have a chance try it. I love trying regional beers.

And you hit on another thing done well in that area - grinders/subs - whatever one wants to call them - very well done up in the Jersey/PA area too

And I am laughing at you thinking Lone Star beer is the face of Texas. It is considered very low cost swill here - something you would find bums on the street drinking, not even considered in the cheaper beer variety - more like a joke beer.

I called it the "Face of Texas" because if you ask someone in Illinois, Virginia or Connecticut ... NAME A TEXAS BEER, 8 out of 10 name Lone Star. One will say Pearl, and one will say something else that may or may not be a Texan beer.

Lone Star has made its way to many other states. I have seen Shiner, too, but didn't know it was Texan. Actually I like Peroni, tastes kind of like Heineken used to. And of course it goes great with an Italian sausage and pepper grinder with sauce and parmesan ... mmm.

Lone Star also had some famous commercials with a beer swilling armadillo.

Moxie was originally marketed (like Coke) as a health elixir. They even had a serious looking bloke on the packaging recommending it with a sinister finger of the "Uncle Sam Wants You" variety. In CT, it is found mostly in the east. It is sort of like Licorice soda and Sarsparilla squared. They have played with the sugar content over the years, and took out some of the medicinal stuff that was probably of marginal value anyway. In its time it was a very big deal, and proud of its strong flavor. The word "moxie" comes from the drink... NOT the other way around.

It is now popping up in an "energy drink" formulation, as all the other legacy third tiers sodas seem to be.

For instance, when Jolt came out in 1985, with that wonderful slogan: "All the Sugar, Twice the Caffeine" they were way ahead of their time. Ten years ahead on the caffeine boon, and more than 20 on the corn syrup backlash. There was one problem. It tasted like swill. Eventually they too went to corn syrup, and then into avant garde fruit flavors to compete with the Snapples and Clearly Canadian drinks dominating the market. It was such a great idea, great packaging, nice product placement in Jurassic Park, but just awful soda.