Thirsty Dudes :: Sweetener :: No Sugar Added

Kohana Cold Brew Coffee

Concentrated cold brew coffee like this is perfect for people who like REALLY strong coffee. I'm sure there are some people that go against the suggestions on the bottle and don't dilute it with any water and milk. I think those people are called men, or dads. Well except for Mike. One might go as far as saying that he's not a real dad because he doesn't like coffee.

For science, I first tried this without diluting it at all. Now I have never drank motor oil, but I'm guessing it's not far from this as far as potency goes. It would make a great coffee energy shot, rough to drink but would immediately energize you. There you go Kohana, I just gave you some free marketing advice.

Once I decided to not be an idiot and drink this like a normal person would, it was fantastic! Great flavor, great taste, I couldn't ask for more of a cold brew coffee. I often forget to cold-brew coffee the night before (I don't drink a lot so I do it in 1 mason jar batches) so it was nice having this bottle for a few days and not having to worry about it. Also not having to deal with stray coffee grounds was also a plus. No matter how hard I try and how many times I filter my cold-brew, I still find little granules every once in a while.

Website: http://www.kohanacoffee.com/

Country: United States

Sweetener: No Sugar Added

Categories: Coffee

Rating: 4/5

Reviewed By: Derek Neuland 2 weeks, 4 days ago

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Runa Focused Energy Unsweetened Guava Guayusa Tea

I’ve said it before, and I’m sure I will say it again; guavas have never let me down. From juices, to teas, to the actual fruit I like everything I have ever tried that it was involved with. I even like the Ween album “Pure Guava.” It’s the magical fruit that can do no wrong.

In that same regard it seems that Runa is a tea company that can also do no harm. I’ve tried a couple of the products and have been impressed by all of them. I want more companies to use guayusa as their tea of choice. It has a more interesting flavor, and as much as I don’t want to admit it, I’ve grown bored of black tea. Yerba mate and guayusa are now my teas of choice. It also helps that they have a decent amount of caffeine in them, as I never want to drink coffee, unless it’s made up all nice and fancy, and I try to drink energy drinks very sparingly, as I don’t want to have heart problems in the future, and there’s a lot of unnatural chemical junk in them.

The thing I love the most about Runa and this tea is that they weren’t afraid to forgo a sweetener. The tea alone would be great unsweetened, but adding the guava makes this perfect. It’s fruity enough that it has it’s own quasi sweetness. It also perfectly balances with the guayusa, so neither flavor overpowers the other. There is a Ying and Yang thing going on with this tea of two great flavors that can also live in perfect harmony together.

Website: http://www.runa.org/

Country: United States

Sweetener: No Sugar Added

Categories: Iced Tea

Rating: 5/5

Reviewed By: Jason Draper 3 weeks ago

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Thirsty Buddha 100% All Natural Coconut Water

The stories and teachings have it all wrong. The tree that Gautama sat under that led him to become the Buddha was not a Bodhi tree as it was taught. In fact, the fat man was sitting under a coconut tree when he reached enlightenment. It's a good thing too, since reaching enlightenment can be truly dehydrating. Lucky for him the most hydrating beverage in the world hung directly over his head. So there you go: from enlightened to shaking a tree and dodging the fruits that descended towards his head within a couple of moments.

Several thousand years have passed since the glorious event and a company called Thirsty Buddha has arisen for a grand celebration in liquid form. All that is contained in this can is 100% all natural coconut water. There are no added sweeteners or preservatives, simply because they are not needed. This is delicious and refreshing; everything the Buddha needed on the day of his enlightenment. There are a lot of companies out there nowadays selling their versions of this "holy" drink, but most of them add extraneous ingredients that take away from the purity of what they create. They made mistakes, Thirsty Buddha did not.

To further offend the followers of Buddhism I shall leave you with the following perversion of faith an pop culture. Imagine the chorus of Destiny's Child's hit single Bootylicious with the lyrics changed to, "I don't think you're ready for this belly, cause his body's too Buddhalicious for ya babe."

Website: http://drinkthirstybuddha.com/

Country: Canada

Sweetener: No Sugar Added

Categories: Coconut

Rating: 4/5

Reviewed By: Jason Draper 3 weeks, 3 days ago

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Invo Coconut Water With Pineapple

I have to bone to pick with the world, the universe, humanity, etc. For 30 some odd years I wandered through life thinking that I hated all things coconut and no one tried to tell me otherwise. You see all I had been exposed to was that toasted garbage that goes on desserts, which is some of the worse tasting trash that has ever graced my tongue. I never knew there was another side of coconut, a fresh side. Finally, for the sake of this website, I drank some coconut water. It wasn’t bad at all. It wasn’t my favorite thing in the world, but it was a whole new beast compared to what I was used to. I would occasionally drink them, and the world was an okay place to be. Then this bottle of coconut water showed up at my door looking for a stomach to call its own. For a week I ignored it, but today I was feeling a bit sluggish, so I gave it a go. WHY DID NO ONE TELL ME THAT THIS EXISTED?!?!?!?!

This is pure glory. It is 100% natural coconut water and juice. There are no concentrates involved. This essentially tastes like a giant ripped open a coconut with its giant strength, then it squeezed the hell out of a pineapple to extract its juice into the open coconut. Finally it took it easy and squeezed a little bit of lime juice in it. For that giant, that would probably be less than a shot of liquid, but for me it’s perfect. It tastes ridiculously fresh like you wouldn’t believe. It’s a taste that I didn’t know existed in the world. So I thank you dear giant and I say screw off to the rest of the world for not letting me know that such a delicious beverage could exist.

Website: http://invo-juice.com/

Country: Thailand

Sweetener: No Sugar Added

Categories: Coconut

Rating: 5/5

Reviewed By: Jason Draper 1 month ago

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Moab Thrive Pomegranate

Super Juices might be the worst superhero troop of all time. Villains would essentially need to do nothing more than be bigger than the largest fruit so that they could squash it. A lemon can thwart all the criminals it wants but against, say, a sheep, it will get trampled. Sure, the lemon might try to squirt some stingy lemon juice in its eye but it's not going to stop the sheep when it's in some sort of sheep rage. Pigs are known terrors. You've seen Snatch, right? I mean come on. Do grapes really stand a chance? Nope. Even together, I welcome any animal that squashes them into a collective murder juice puddle so I can drink this juice.

Look, it's nothing exceptional but it does not go without mentioning that it is a good juice nonetheless. It's chocked full of all sorts of different fruits like plums, peaches, pineapple, black currant, elderberry and many more. It's actually kind of a waste that it's not more of a medley because it just tastes like a good pomegranate juice. Come on. If you're going to go through all the trouble to wrangle up camu camu, muscat grapes, and black raspberries, you shouldn't focus your efforts on just one dude. My two cents. This superhero isn't going to save me from anything other than if a banana shows up and wants to join in the festivities. If they do, super team, please save me.

Website: http://www.superjuices.com/

Country: United States

Sweetener: No Sugar Added

Categories: Juice

Rating: 3/5

Reviewed By: Mike Literman on 4/22/2013

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La Colombe Pure Black Coffee

Mike Thirsty Dude (or should it be Thirsty Dude Mike?) called me last night pleading with me to review this. Okay, maybe it was actually just asking me nicely. Mike was under the impression that this was going to be a coffee soda, but in actuality it's just cold pressed coffee. He admitted that he likes coffee drinks, but not straight coffee so knowing that I love coffee he thought it was best that I take a shot at this.

While I normally drink my coffee with a little soy/almond/rice/coconut milk and sugar, I know good coffee when I taste it. I lived in Portland for almost 3 years where it's mandatory that you fall in love with Stumptown Coffee. While normally I would add the aforementioned things into this, for science I will drink it without.

The awesome thing about cold brew coffee is that you get a richer coffee flavor from the beans. Because the beans are never subjected to hot water, it has a much lower acidity in the taste. Anyone who has had gas station coffee that's been sitting out for hours knows that taste. It's super easy to cold brew at home, especially if you have a french press. All you do is course grind the beans, put them in a mason jar and fill it with cold water. Mix it well and put the lid on it. Then place the jar in the fridge for 12 hours, take it out and press the coffee in the french press. Now this is coffee concentrate, so you can add milk or water to taste to dilute it. Or if you love REALLY strong coffee, you can just drink it straight.

Now back to La Colombe. I haven't had many bottled cold brew coffees before, but what I have had been nothing short of awesome. This was no exception and they definitely give cold brew/pressed coffee a good name. It has a really awesome and complex rich taste. Since I don't normally drink black coffee, this is a sipping coffee for me (much like espresso) and it's a great way to savor the flavor. (Note, that rhyme I just wrote was 100% unintentional and I'm kind of embarrassed by it but decided to leave it in for some unknown reason, then write this big long unnecessary apology that brings more attention to it).

Website: http://lacolombe.com

Country: United States

Sweetener: No Sugar Added

Categories: Coffee

Rating: 4/5

Reviewed By: Derek Neuland on 4/22/2013

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Buy Now: La Colombe Pure Black Coffee

Naked Boosted Blue Machine

Did you ever wonder why Gargamel was always trying to get at the Smurfs? Some theories are that he wanted to turn them into gold, he thought they would be a delicious treat or that he just hated them and wanted to destroy them. Truth is that good ole Gargy just needed their blood to power his doomsday machine. He was actually quite upset about their eventual destruction. He spent many a late nights sitting up with Azrael, crying about how such innocent creatures needed to die just so he could completely destroy the rest of the human race. You see at school everyone picked on him for being bald and ugly. Oh, you didn’t know that Gargamel was actually a high school student? Well he was. The entire Smurf world was really just a school shooting about to happen. It was sad really to see a boy so confused.

Eventually Gargy grew up and started a Fortune 500 company. He invested a lot and created this juice in homage to the creatures he once thought he had to destroy. All proceeds go to Smurfs all around the world. It’s like reparations: reparations that are a mixture of blueberries, blackberries, apples and a banana. It mostly just tastes like blueberries though with some other flavors around the edges. Gargamel tried to list them as Smurfberries on the label, but the FDA wouldn’t hear a word of it. If he had just reversed the percentages of blackberries to blueberries this would perhaps be the world’s finest drink, but alas he did not and what we are left with is still delicious.

Website: http://www.nakedjuice.com

Country: United States

Sweetener: No Sugar Added

Categories: Juice, Smoothie

Rating: 5/5

Reviewed By: Jason Draper on 4/18/2013

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Hi Ball Sparkling Energy Water Grapefruit

I’m sorry this is not what you expected sir, but in all honesty did you really expect to be handed a scotch and soda or some such libation? I mean we are at an elementary school music recital. It would be more than a little irresponsible to serve alcohol at such an event. I’m actually shocked that these Hi Ball energy drinks were available in the vending machine. I mean why would kids grade K-6 have any need for energy drinks? Actually, why would kids so young have access to a vending machine? Shouldn’t they be learning the basics of their educations, not chugging away at a soda?

Anyways, stop your complaining and try the drink. It’s like tonic water with a splash of grapefruit flavoring in it. It’s like a grapefruit seltzer, and it’s not bad at all. It has organic caffeine, guarana and ginseng in it, and you would never be able to tell from the taste. I know you wanted to get drunk to make it through this night, but at least this will save you the embarrassment of your child seeing you fall asleep during his/her solo.

Sir I will not get you another. I’d like to point out for the third time that I’m not a waiter. I’m actually just another parent who’s seat you have taken. Don’t give me that garbage about not having assigned seats. You clearly moved my jacket that was on the chair when I went to the restroom. You also dumped my wife’s purse out when she asked you to move. Now that I think about it, your trench coat leads me to believe that you’re child isn’t even in this production. Security!

Website: http://www.hiballer.com

Country: United States

Sweetener: No Sugar Added

Categories: Energy Drink, Sparkling, Water

Rating: 3/5

Reviewed By: Jason Draper on 4/14/2013

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Buy Now: Hi*Ball Water Energy Grapefruit 16 oz (Pack Of 12)

Fave Pomegranate Blueberry Goji

It is a bit audacious to call your company "Fave." It's just presumptive. That's not to say that this isn't going to be someone's favorite because it's not too bad. There are fruits and vegetables inside this little number and for the most part, it's pretty good. This drink is mostly fruity with only a touch of...strangeness. I know that makes it sound bad but it really isn't. It's a tangy juice with a little bit of lies inside of it. It's a white lie, which is globally acceptable for some reason. It's like there is an unspoken asterisk next to the phrase that means people don't get offended when you flat out lie to their face. Adultery, murder, and speeding don't get you in trouble if you explicit say it as a white lie.

Website: http://favejuice.com/

Country: United States

Sweetener: No Sugar Added

Categories: Juice

Rating: 3/5

Reviewed By: Mike Literman on 4/11/2013

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Naked Boosted Red Machine

Silly Americans. You thought the cold war was over and that you had won. You believed the movie Clue when it told you that Communism was nothing but a red herring and that capitalism was the true motivator. You have been duped and now we have infiltrated your very culture. Who do you think own all the Red Robin restaurants? It is us, working on getting you fat and slovenly. Did you really think that Red Bull was there to just help you get through your day? We created the company in order to weaken your hearts for the battles to come.

We even have some products over there for the sole benefit of our agents who are stuck on your soil. With all the garbage that you produce and consume we needed to make sure there were some things that were healthy for our people to consume. We bribed some of the higher ups at Naked and they created a special blend for us that they call “Red Machine.” It is a mixture of all of the finest communist fruits to remind our people what they are fighting for. Each bottle contains 13 raspberries, 11 strawberries, 3 cranberries, ¼ of a pomegranate, 1 ½ of an apple and 7 red grapes. We also mixed in 1/3 of an orange and ½ of a banana, as well as a bunch of other vitamins and the like to ensure continued health. While you and your countrymen choke on their excessive calorie and sugar intake, the people’s people will remain at the peak of their health drinking these wonderful prepackaged smoothies. They taste like nothing but wonderful red fruit. It has been formulated so that the other ingredients are not evident in the taste. What you get has a strong berry flavor with the slightest hints of the bitterness of cranberries and pomegranate.

America, you stand no chance. Our day will come soon, and on that day all class struggles will cease to be. You will be too bloated with weak hearts to stop us.