You know in the Declaration of Independence where it says “We hold these truths to be self-evident?” Well, all seltzers being created equal was most definitely not one of those truths that our Founding Fathers were referring to. It's probably because it's not a truth at all. It's a flat out lie. Sure 90% of the seltzer waters out there are created equally, but then there is the other 10% who rise above and boy do they shine. I've drunk a lot of grapefruit seltzer over the past few years and I have to tell you, this is #1 with a bullet. The secret to its success is really no secret at all; there is 8% juice in this can, which equates to 3g of sugar. I'll take that tradeoff for a far superior beverage. It's like your dear grandmamma squeezed her morning grapefruit into a glass of sparkling water. Juice is the key to a lot of things in this life. I've never been in a situation where real juice has made anything taste worse. Take note…€¦.well…€¦everyone.

I went in to 7-11 looking for one thing and left for something probably way better. I have not had a true Pepsi Fire myself. I say "true" because I got a Slurpee and, in true fashion, I mixed it up. I thought that I would get one for myself tonight but I got sidetracked by this little beauty and what a little beauty it was.

This is lightly sweetened and very strongly flavored. Nice hibiscus flavor. There are "other berries" in there, sure but it's a wonderful evening treat. The rooibos, which I am unfortunately 50/50 on, won me over in this particular drink. Sometimes I feel it can be strong for my taste but everything was done very well here. Very well indeed. There are other flavors out there. Something to think about. Something to dream about.

Busy Bee is batting 1,000. That's sports talk for rating perfectly, correct? If not, then whatever the analogy would be to say that they have achieved perfect marks is the one we will go with. I mean I guess it was no shock that if you mix yerba mate, ginger and lime you're going to have a winner on your hands. Actually for most people that might be something new and unheard of. To me it's a delicious dream.

Like all of their beverages the yerba mate is the driving force. The other flavors are just an added bonus. You can taste the ginger a decent amount, but it does not give you any burn. Normally that would equate to a complaint from me, but this drink doesn't need the burn to carry it. It is perfect just the way it is. The lime is there in a limeade fashion, as the label suggests. This is almost like the mate/limeade version of an Arnold Palmer, but with the mix 75/25 in favor of the tea.
I really can't get enough of these drinks. They are my favorite beverage that I have come across in quite some time.

Back in the 30's bartenders on the movie lot would mix up some ginger ale (or lemon lime if it was all they had) with some grenadine and throw in a cherry to make it seem special. These drinks had a singular use; they were used to bride a child actress into giving some good takes for the “talkies.” They would pretend they were grown up drinks and only girls who performed well earned their grown up drink. Mix up one of these cocktails and those little feet would be dancing up a storm, never missing a step. If she messed up though, she was given straight sour mix.

Is any of this true? I have no idea. As far as I know this beverage was created by a bartender at bowling alley who was trying to appease the kids on a Saturday afternoon. That, at least, is my history with it. Whatever its origin story it's a great little drink. This Batch version of the classic drink doesn't quite capture the essence of the bowling alley version that I love from my youth, but it is a cleaner, more distinguished version. I mean it's not coming out of a soda gun, so chances are it's going to be of better quality. Whether you're trying to get kids to dance, or to bowl there really isn't a better beverage for the job.

Hydrive has updated their formulas as well as their look and both are for the better. The bottles now look less street corner bodega and more co-op market. I'm not talking trash on the bodegas of the world. I spend way too much time in them and love them. Their coolers just always look like a hodgepodge mess of bottles who themselves have a hodgepodge mess of design work. The new Hydrive designs are very clean looking and I find them more visually appealing. A twelve year old may not.

As for the new reformulation of the flavor it no longer tastes like melted down sugar free candy. In fact, even though it is sweetened with sucralose it doesn't taste overly diet at all. Like the new design work the new taste is also very crisp and clean. It kind of just tastes like flavored water with a hint of sweetness. Well that might be an exaggeration, but you get the idea. It doesn't taste like a diet mess. It's not something I would normally drink, but I enjoyed it enough for what it is; a non-carbonated energy drink that doesn't taste like chemicals, or like an energy drink at all.

When you see a beverage that is called Fire, you expect some heat behind it. The first thought in my head was that this was going to be Pepsi with capsaicin (aka what makes peppers burn your guts). Half of a second of reading told me that it was really just Pepsi with cinnamon in it. Why the masochist in me was hoping for a drink that would cause me to sweat and leak tears everywhere, I was actually intrigued by the idea of cinnamon cola. I mean sure, I'd rather have the option to have a drink on hand that I could use to play pranks on friends and watch their mouths burn off, but I mean I guess I'll take this.

To be honest, as I took my first sip, I thought that it really didn't taste all that different from regular Pepsi and I thought I had bought myself a one way ticket to bummer city. Then the after taste kicked in. Oh what a wonderful aftertaste it is. It's all cinnamon and spice and even a little heat. I can thankfully say that the soda lived up to its name.
With subsequent sips I learned that if you swished it around your mouth a bit, it opened up the flavor of the cinnamon. It makes you feel like a wine aficionado, except without all of the…€¦you know…€¦.taste of rot and decay.
I surprisingly really enjoyed this. I do have to mention that after drinking an entire bottle over about a half hour I did get quite the stomach ache and by ache I mean burn. I guess it really does meet its nomenclature. I would also like to point out that if this would have been part of the 1893 line and made with that base, it would have been through the roof fantastic. I'm talking like life changing good.

This is…€¦weird. By this point I know what I'm getting into with Mati, but this time around, it's still weird. It is still mostly has the guayusa flavor, but the peach mango aspect of it is what makes it so strange. Both fruits are very present, but even though everything about this is natural, they certainly don't taste that way. This is what I would expect sentient robots from the future to think these fruits taste like. Can fruit taste digital? I don't want to say they taste like peach and mango flavored chemicals, more like microchips are telling my android brain that it tastes these flavors. I don't know how it happened since there is no garbage in here. It's not a particularly unpleasant, it's just unusual, you know like pop stars in the 80s.

I shouldn't like this. Cracking open this can should be a one way ticket to Boringville, USA. In my world lemon is overrated and unnecessary. I would rather drink plain water than with a slice of lemon in it. Somehow I find this quite refreshing though. Perhaps it's because the lemon taste it more upfront. Sure, it only has 5% lemon juice, but I assure you that lemon water you get at a restaurant probably have less than .5% juice. If there were sugar in this I would even call it a lemonade. It's simple. It's clean. It's a little bit of alright. It may not take you to Flavortown, but it would take less time to get there than to Boringville.

There is magic in that mate. It has to be as simple as that. I don't know if it technically is classified as a tea, but for my purposes I will chose to call it that. To that end yerba mate is my tea of choice when it is in its iced form. Guayaki is the company that turned me on to this wonder, but busy Bee may be the ones who perfected it. The quantities I could drink of this are absolutely ridiculous. I don't know when the last time I was this excited about a tea was, and to that end I believe magic is involved. Now I'm not saying there are dark arts involved. It may just be some guy in the bottling plant that pulls rabbits out of hats to assume the other employees (you know the ones who look at him with disdain) breaking health code violations all day long. I believe that that enough could somehow force a little something extra into this product to make it the wonder that sits in front of me, or rather the wonder that once filled the empty bottle that sits in front of me. Is it really gone so fast?

The base of this is clearly the earthy flavor of yerba mate. It apparently is unsmoked. I didn't know that was a thing because I am a yerba mate-dummy. They are apparently doing things right though because it tastes wonderful. On top of that is a wonderful combination of orange and wildflower honey. It all melds together into greatness. Nothing is overpowering the other flavors and that is the way things should be. It tastes like it was made by someone's zany grandmother who doesn't believe in black tea and only drinks mate. She's a wise old lady with a tale for every wrinkle on her body.

Busy Bee is somehow connected to Texas Tea, which I can find around Buffalo. I can only hope this new brand/flavors make their way this far north so I can guzzle them all day long.

What are we celebrating? Did someone get a raise? Did someone get fired? Was it Carol? I never liked her anyhow. Oh, she's still here? Oh, she actually got a raise? Oh, she's standing right behind me? Does she look mad? She does? Oh. Well. I guess I'll have to face this like a man. Hello, Carol. It's so nice to see you. Lovely day outside, isn't it? Did you get your hair done? You didn't? You actually have baby puke in your hair? I thought someone was eating cottage cheese. Congratulations on your raise. You are a hard worker and it's good to see all your hard work didn't go unnoticed, which is more than I can say for myself.

I've brought these celebratory drinks. They taste like a mimosa made with orange juice and non-alcoholic champagne sweetened with Erytritol, you know, to keep it diet. It tastes fine but that artificial sweetener is really prominent as if to scream to the world and make it as apparent as possible that you're on a diet. No, I didn't say it looked like you had to go on a diet. No I didn't say that I didn't like you. I said...I said I didn't like "shoes." I didn't like your shoes. I don't like your shoes, Carol. They're just too cool. "Too Cool Carol" is what I'm going to call you. You're making the rest of us look bad, Carol. Everyone hates you because you're too cool. Look out everyone, "Too Cool Carol" is coming through with her baby puke shirt and cool shoes and a raise. Look out! Everyone get out of the way.

A large part of me wants to dedicate my life to science in order to create/discover a zero calorie sweetener that has no real taste, other than that of real sugar. I completely applaud people for watching their calories and realizing that there is far too much sugar in most mass marketed consumables. On the whole we are not a healthy country and I appreciate when companies and consumers step up to try to do something about it. The problem is that the healthier sweeteners that sugar and corn syrup are swapped out for have specific tastes of their own, which just also happen to be very strong. I will happily admit that erythritol and stevia are preferable to other garbage zero calorie sweeteners out there, but they are still overpowering. If they were not included in this beverage it would taste wonderfully like raspberries. You can tell that this is a beverage that would actually taste like raspberries and not some generic fake berry flavor. Unfortunately it is buried under the flavor of the sweeteners.

This could have been incredible tasting, and still healthy if only another sweetener option existed. I'm going to don my lab coat, get out some beakers and get to work. I will not rest until I have an answer that will let this beverage be what it so desperately wants to, and deserves to be! Either that or until it's lunchtime. I'm actually kind of hungry not. I'm going to make a PB sandwich.

It's the time of year again when the sun is finally starting to shine in Buffalo and the temperatures are on the rise. That also means that it's time for Polar to release their Summer line and this year it's a doozy. Some old favorites like Mango Berry are back, but more importantly are the new flavors like this little guy right here. I don't know who the genius is that thought this up, but I would certainly like to shake their hand, scratch that…€¦give them a huge hug of thanks.

I never knew that pineapple was a flavor that I was missing from seltzer, but now that I have it I don't think I'll ever be able to look back. This is really 85% pineapple 15% grapefruit. I'm completely fine with that ratio. It could have been 100% pineapple and I wouldn't have complained, but as it is the grapefruit rounds out the edges a bit. The amount of this I will be drinking this summer is out of control. If Polar really wants all of my money they will make a pineapple vanilla. I would pre-order case upon case of it.

Why is it that a combination of salt and lime sounds enticing (and Mexican, but switch out that citrus fruit for another and it sounds off? The thought of it certainly had me putting off drinking this. I knew it wouldn't be horrible, but it just didn't sound like something I wanted. When I finally got around to it I was pleasantly surprised. Sure it doesn't make me think of the millions of tacos I would like to consume, but who is eating tacos while playing sports? Geniuses maybe?

The salt in here is noticeable, but Kra did not go overboard with it. It really just tastes like a more natural lemon sports drink. You score all the points, you make all the goals and then you rehydrate with one of these. You won't be sorry. It's a better version of what you are used to, and what more could you ask for?

Now I'm going to go run a marathon and down a taco at every quarter mile.

Orange and mango are good buds. They're arguably both orange. That lumps them into that category. Really, that's it. They're also just a good pair. This tastes more like orange juice than a 50/50 split. I'd happily give it 75/25 if we're going to put numbers on it.

This was given to my mammy as a way to promote the product. Well, they didn't know who her son was. Most people don't. I am but a man. A sexy, attractive, talented, man of a man. A man who decided to spend the last seven years writing crud about drinks. This being one of them. What do I have to say about it? It's good. Simple as that. Personally I like the other Izze drinks because they're lighter and simpler. This is...not thicker...but denser. It's a sparkling juice. They call it like a sparkling soda, water and juice simultaneously and it is all of them and it is one of them. Is it confusing? No. You know why? Who is going to fight over what this is. Whatever it is, it's sparkling and fruity and drinkable. Don't put baby in the corner. Just drink it.

This is pretty darn tart, in a good way. A bulk of the flavor comes from a combination of passionfruit and lime juice. The rest of it is the guayusa. If nothing else this is very interesting. It's the type of drink that requires a learning curve. If you go into it blind I would expect that you wouldn't really enjoy it and that it would just taste weird. When you know what you are getting you can start to enjoy it. The more you drink it the more you enjoy it. It is a bit odd drinking something that is passionfruit flavored that is not super sweet, but life goes on and by the time I reached the end of this can I was totally on board, even if I was tentative with the first few sips.

Most seltzers/sparkling waters keep things simple with just carbonated water and some sort of flavoring, usually under the umbrella of “natural flavoring.” Who knows what those natural flavors are? They could be any sort of weirdness that exists in nature, but has a similar taste to the flavor the company is trying to put forth. Who is to say that snail spit doesn't taste like blackberries?

Spindrift lets you know what you are getting, and I feel that due to the percentage listed they use more of it than most companies, which is apparent also in the taste. This can says it contains 7” juice and that comes from the “fresh orange juice” and “alphonso mango puree” listed in the ingredients. Sure that little bit of juice gives you 1g of sugar per can, but isn't they tiny amount worth knowing what's in your drink let alone how superior it tastes. It still very much tastes like a seltzer and not a sparkling juice, and that is the way it should be in this beverage. Both orange and mango are present enough to be noticed and taste real, but still faint enough to drink it without thinking about it.

Ahh. A nice, opaque tea in the morning. What better thing to start off the day? That's what I said to myself as I miraculously got my dumb son to school on time and still had time to buy this maroon treat for myself.

What is it? Well it's unsweetened black tea with an undisclosed amount of blackberry puree in it and some assorted chunks of strawberries. It's also available for a limited time so I thought, "I need to get this before it's too late!" as if I didn't get it, I would regret it for the rest of my life like the time that I wanted to see DJ Rashad in Toronto but couldn't find anyone to go with me and he died the next day. That type of regret.

She's good, though. I think there is so much puree that you can't taste any tea, though. "Problem" with that is that the puree itself is so good that you almost don't care and then hate yourself for saying such apathetic things about tea, the lifeblood of everywhere but America, who, ironically and allegedly, runs on Dunkin'. Every once in a while you're treated to a bullet to the back of your throat disguised as mushed up strawberry that is more fun than gross. If you might like tea, like fruit juice and enjoy working on your cheek muscles, this is a great summer drink for you.

I'm always interested in trying “alternative” energy drinks. I'm not really sure who dubbed them that, but at some point a person or a sentient computer decided that any beverage that was meant to give you energy, but did not contain taurine and a bunch of chemicals wasn't of the norm. I'd like to think that ingesting artificial ingredients would be out of the norm, but who am I. Naturewise tried to remove the stigma by labeling their beverages “Whole Body Vitality Drinks.” They give you a little pep, enhance focus, suppress food cravings (don't we all need that?), and reduce stress. That all sounds like a good deal to me and I will take the change in moniker to have it.

This is sweetened by erythritol, stevia and monk fruit and it has a strong fruity/bubblegum taste that always accompanies the latter of the three. The first time I ever came across monk fruit was in Vemma, and now I always relate anything with it to that weird pyramid scheme energy drink. It's a very specific taste and a strong one at that. In fact it is a contender for the prize of being the strongest flavor in this can. The magic trick that monk fruit plays is that the more you drink of a beverage the less you notice the taste and the other flavors take over.
The flavor of this is supposed to be citrus matcha, which sounds great. The thing is I don't really taste any specific citrus, nor do I get a strong green tea flavor. What I do get is something that, to me, tastes kind of like Juicy Fruit gum. It's actually kind of great, but it's not what I expected. Towards the end of the can I got a bit more tea flavor, and I think the bottom ¼ of it was the peak of the flavor.

I am always pleased when a company can make a beverage that uses zero calorie sweeteners and the don't taste like specific garbage. It's nice to be able to enjoy a beverage and not feel bad for all the calories you just ingested, and that is from someone who has never been on a diet in their life.

This is the last of the three Wicked Lekker teas that are currently available and if they are nothing they are a consistent company. They are actually more than just consistent though. They are a company that makes great tasting teas that I could sip day after day and not get sick of them.

I love peaches, but I am wary of peach flavored things because they have a tendency to taste candied and that is something I'm just not looking for. After my first taste of Wikked Lekker's black currant I was pretty sure they were going to do right by peach and I was not disappointed. It actually tastes like fruit and the use of white tea is always the wise choice. It has a softer taste that sits a little in the background and gives the rest of the drink a little time to make your acquaintance. After the rooibos tea says “what's up and stuff” to your taste buds the white peach slips in to make sure that everyone is getting along well, and trust me it's a love fest in there and my mouth wants to host that party for a long time to come.

I don't know if I will ever get used to non-carbonated energy drinks. Yes, I know the original energy drinks (coffee and tea) were not carbonated and served this world for hundreds of years without people complaining that they needed more. Times have changed though and when I see the word energy listed on a beverage the taste of chemical bubblegum-y citrus flashes across my senses. The thing is that it's not that great of a flavor, we've just become acclimated to it. It's a nice change of pace to have a product that will give you a rush of caffeine and vitamins to help get you through the day that is out of the norm.

This tastes like a plant was bottling some diet black cherry soda, but the line to carbonate it was out of order and also about 1/3 more water got into it than should have. I understand those sound like negative things, but this is better than any black cherry soda I've ever tasted. It also tastes way less diet than I had anticipated since it is sweetened with sucralose. I expected that horrible fake sweetness to punch me right in my uvula, but it turns out it's fairly mild. To such an extent that I believe it could be passed off as “energy flavor.”

Black cherry may not be my flavor of choice, but I have no real complaints about this. It gave me the little boost I needed to get me through my work day and it did it while maintaining a decent taste. What more can you ask for in these times?