Paeroa is a little town on the North Island of New Zealand. It is the birthplace of L&P: Lemon & Paeroa – New Zealand’s world famous soft drink.
What’s that? You’ve never heard of it? Well that’s because you’re
not a New Zealander. L&P only claims to be ‘World Famous in New
Zealand’, so if you’re not from there, chances are you may never have
come across it.
I should also explain “soft drinks”. For those of your from North
America, we call ‘soda’ or ‘pop’ by the general term “soft drinks”.
The verdict? Well, I am not big on root beer (except for ginger beer –
which I love) and L&P seems to have something else in it apart from
lemon. At first, I assumed, quite reasonably, that the other ingredient
was Paeroa. I was wrong. As mentioned above, Paeroa is the town from
which the drink hails.
But there is something else in there. It tastes, to me, medicinal.
Like sarsaparilla. So while Lemon & Paeroa has not won me over, I
know that a great deal of North America would probably love it. To them I
say: get to New Zealand’s as soon as you can. Just one sip might be
worth the trip!