If you’ve ever thought that your sausage wasn’t enough like soda, Johnsonville has a new product just for you.
The mad scientists in Sheboygan Falls are on the cusp of launching Johnsonville Dr Pepper Inspired Sausage, and I’ll forgive you for closing this tab right now.
This is a product, of course, built on hype, and the campaign is shot through with cheeky language fully aware of the novelty of the product it’s pitching. It urges folks to use #FizzyGlizzy to spread their spicy takes on the sausage. The press release touts it as “an unprecedented, yet wholly inevitable, sausage” and asks whether this is “a culinary innovation or a sign of the apocalypse?”
It’s time to pick your Milwaukee favorites for the year!
Johnsonville sent samples so Milwaukee Magazine could find out, and we did so with an office grill sesh on Thursday. (Sadly, our dining critic, Ann Christenson, was not in the office yesterday, so you only get amateur takes here.) The condiments included in the campaign-branded box were wild: Takis Fuego, cherry Pop Rocks, Funyuns, a cherry spread, barbecue sauce and Tajin.
I went first – a true people leader, I am – and had three of the bunned-and-thirded links, variously topped, so I’ll lead with my thoughts.
It was, yes, very weird. The soda element was clear immediately upon even opening the package – that amorphously sweet Dr Pepper aroma wafted out ahead of any sausage whiff. I went for the condiment jugular with my first Fizzy Glizzy, topping it with the Pop Rocks and Takis. And it was … good? Maybe? The soda flavoring is not subtle – why would it be in a product like this? – and it does work with the smokiness of the sausage. That is an opinion, it must be noted, and opinions varied widely on this front, as we’ll get to.
The condiments definitely added to the fun if not the culinary effectiveness of the sausage, with the Pop Rocks accenting one of Dr Pepper’s “23 flavors” and the Takis adding a little heat. Both were textural winners, providing some crunch and the Pop Rocks evoking the fizzy in this glizzy.
As Johnsonville itself predicts in its messaging around this product, not everyone was so generous in their takes.
One co-worker whom I talked into taking a bite did not finish chewing it, instead spitting it into a napkin. “It tastes just like Dr Pepper,” she said, which I said sounded good. “Not when you have the feel of a sausage in your mouth,” she responded. Fair.
One taster suggested the soda flavor was subtle, which prompted several “Subtle?!??!” reactions. “Not the worst,” another said. No thanks – too sweet, another said. You can taste it before you even bite it, one taster said. “Nice and juicy,” said another, focusing on perhaps the most mundane part of this sausage.
One of the few to really wade into the condiments said the Funyuns worked well with the sausage, “elevating it somewhat”; my last bite had them on it, and I concur. A more conventional accompaniment was also positively noted: the sweet buns we used to cradle our Fizzy Glizzies. One taster lamented that we did not have Dr Pepper to pair with the sausage, which … yeah, that was an oversight on my part.
Are we buying Johnsonville Dr Pepper Inspired Sausage for our impending grilling season? Probably not. Maybe as a stunt-food option for a party or something, with an array of silly toppings. But not for, like, a Tuesday night dinner.
The best suggestion from our team, though, was to reverse this corporate collaboration and have Dr Pepper come out with a sausage-flavored soda. That idea is free, folks!
The Fizzy Glizzies officially launch nationwide March 1.
