No Sugar Added - 718 Reviews

More! I need more! Look, here's the problem. I only have a limited amount of juice box containers but I have a truckload of fruit. So, what I'm going to need you to do is put as much fruit in each juice box as possible because, and this may sound strange, I hate fruit. If there is one extra orange, I won't eat it. I will throw it in the garbage. Do you know what I hate more than fruit? Wasting fruit. Fruit is money. Time is money. Money is money. So what have you got for me, Sam?

Well boss, I've got this. I cannot fit any more juice and I feel there is a fair representation of all the fruits in there. Ready for the breakdown? Here goes. In each box, we've got half an orange, two-thirds of a banana, half an apple, half a mango, and an eighth of a pineapple. You didn't buy any grapes but I don't know if we could even fit grapes in here. Somehow we managed to make it taste like mango and orange exclusively even though there are so many other fruits in there. It's technically a smoothie, but it's not terribly thick and nicely sweet due to the apple probably. Do you want a taste?

Sam, let me ask you a question; do you want me to throw up on your already dirty Reeboks? I didn't think so. I trust you with this one so box 'em and ship 'em. We're ready for phase two; profit!

I like green apples better than red apples. I think it's a matter of crispness and crunch. Red apples just don't have the same pizzazz to me as green apples. I just saw an apple on the can and assumed that it was apple juice. Just regular old apple juice. Nothing special. Apple juice. You know, apples go great with cinnamon and honey. I think it's a Jewish delicacy. I seem to remember wearing nice clothes eating bread and apples and cinnamon and honey. Wouldn't you love to be able to drink an apple and cinnamon juice sweetened with honey? Oh. I'm so excited. I hope this exists.

I was pleasantly surprised that this was green apple, which I didn't know until my first sip. Thing is, initial sips lead me to a delicious, green apple-dom. Aftertaste is a bit bitter and I am on the fence if I like it or not. For all I know, this could be the exact same sensation that happens when I eat a real green apple but without the chewing and the apple skin and the whole experience, I might miss the strange aftertaste that Snapple is telling me belongs there.

This is a nice way to kick off a week. It's different, it's juice, and it might actually be good for you. I look forward to finding more of these 100% Juiced drinks somewhere.

Chocolate and cherries? A match made in heaven. Chocolate and most products is fantastic. Meat, fruit, probably some vegetables, more chocolate, bread...seriously. Chocolate rules. Cherries are great. They're no chocolate, but they're great. Who doesn't love that time of year where cherries aren't seventeen dollars a pound and you can enjoy their presence in your house until a week later where you have to create your own pyramid scheme to afford the little, red fruit?

I had high hopes for this drink because of the chocolate and cherry but when I noticed that rose was in there, I thought it was going to be like eating a cherry cordial out of a really old woman's blouse. Was I wrong? Unfortunately, I was not. You get cherry and an insufficient amount of chocolate but then a titch of fermented rose and that is a flavor that ruins the aforementioned delicious duo.

I can see this being enjoyed, but not by me, so much. It's like chocolate, cherry, rose, beer. If that sounds good for you, you, my friend, have a new favorite drink. In the meantime, I'm going to try and stop thinking of eating and drinking out of old lady's clothing. The things that go on underneath an eighty-seven year old woman's shirt is not for me.

Welcome to the first day of Fizz Ed. My name is Christopher Fabiano and I will be your instructor for the semester. I see a bunch of you have changed into gym shorts and tee shirts with sports logos on them. Those of you that have, like so many before you, are mistaken as to what class you have enrolled in. I understand your confusion due to the fact that we meet in the school's gymnasium and I admit the name can be confusing, especially to the youth of today who's grammar and spelling has gone right down the pooper due to computers and texting. This class is not I repeat IS NOT physical education. It is in fact Fizz Education, or the study of carbonation and more importantly soda and other fizzy beverages. Yes this class is a dream come true for some, but for those of you who are upset about this, there are withdrawal slips by the door. No one's feelings will be hurt if you walk out that door.

Okay now that everyone but six of you have left let's get down to business. Basically this semester we will learn the science behind soda and by the end of the semester you will be brewing your own. All you stoner slackers out there, I know you're thinking that you can use this knowledge to brew your own beer. Well, I hate to break it to you, but that is a different process altogether and while it is interesting the school board won't let me teach it. I mean come on it's a shock that this class exists at all.

Before we start can anyone tell me the difference between soda pop and sparkling juice? No one? Well this is certainly going to be a long semester. Okay the difference really boils down to the amount of sugar added to the drink. I'm glad so many people left because I only have a handful of cans to share with everyone. So take one and pass the bag to the person next to you. What you now hold in your hands is a near perfect example of a sparkling juice. It is also a brand I created to help me in teaching this class. Like the name? Ideally I would have used fresh fruit juice, but with budget cuts what they are I had to settle with using concentrates. I then added carbonated water, and bam magic was made. Notice I did not add any sweeteners. The fruit juice is nice and sweet as it is and it makes for a wonderfully refreshing drink. For this batch I used red raspberries and I think you can really taste it. Of course due to those aforementioned budget cuts I couldn't use pure raspberry juice, so I cut it with apple juice. You can slightly taste the apples, but it still is mostly raspberry. It truly is a wonderful thing if I do say so myself.

For the next time we meet I want you each to write a 25-page paper describing the evolution of soda and how it differs from sparkling juices. What did you think this was going to be a blow off class? Think again!

Oh, hello there. I didn't see you there. May I ask, what are you doing in my kitchen? Oh, you just needed milk. Well it seems that a more reasonable place would be a store and not my kitchen at 7:15 in the morning. I guess, since you're wearing a bathrobe, slippers, and flannel pants, I'm not in any danger there. What's that in your pocket? Oh, a spoon? Well in the top shelf to your left are bowl and over here is the cereal if you want to sit down with me and have breakfast. It might be nice, just us guys. My wife is at work and my kids are at school. I usually leave around eight so we've got some time.

Oh, me? I'm just going to have this tea my previously mentioned wife bought for me. It's unsweetened so I don't feel bad about drinking it so early in the morning. I haven't had it. Have you had those chocolate Cherrios yet? No? What a morning for an adventure, eh friend? I will tell you, you will not be disappointed as I have had many a bowl and they are delicious.

Oh, how's this tea? Eh. It's a textbook definition of unsweetened tea, which means it's good but nothing special. It's smooth and tastes like tea because it is tea, but it's really nothing more. I don't know what I expected as it is, after all, just unsweetened tea. No bells and whistles here. How is your cereal? You love it? I knew it. We're one for two and I guess that's not bad for this early in the morning. Hey, I've got to get ready to go to work. Can you lock up on your way out? I just got Sonic Generations for the Xbox if you want to play. It's a lot of fun. If you're going to be here later, we're getting pizza and wings. You're welcome to stay if you want just please don't scare my wife when she gets home. She'll probably pee her pants and although that's hilarious to us, it's more inconvenient to her.

Hey seltzer heads! Yeah, you guys! I've got something for you. It's in the trunk of my car. Yeah, it is legal. Just because a man has a pallet filled with a random assortment of drinks in the back of his windowless van doesn't mean they fell off a truck or anything. Maybe a man just likes to spread the word about sparkling drinks once in a while. Who I am is not of any importance to you, ma'am. My license places? They fell off the van so don't worry about it.

Coconut? Yeah, I've got it. It's right here. Made by a company called La Croix. I guess they are some fancy French company or something. Michigan? Well, ma'am, sorry about shutting you up earlier. Yeah, I guess these guys here are from America. I thought we hated the French. Taste? Oh, now you all want free samples? One can. One can between the...twenty-one...twenty-two...twenty-three of you. Here. One can. No more. Good right? Coconut-y, right? Unsweetened, right? Yes? Right? How many pallets can I put you down for? One? I drove all the way out here from None Of Your Business-burg for one pallet? Fair enough. You've got me. That will be $674.99. Yeah, and ninety-nine cents. I've got to make ends meet too, lady.

So it's finally 2012. According to the Mayans it's the beginning of the end. Their highly accurate calendar ends on December 21, 2012. I for one say so be it. The end of the world has to be more exciting than most anything else this world has to offer. Have you ever seen disaster movies? There's never a dull moment. I'm rooting for earthquakes and tidal waves. A new ice age would be terrible. Who wants to be cold, even in death? I'm not saying one way or another if it's true, or if I really care either way. The Thirsty Dudes way is the path of apathy. Funnyman John Hodgman claims to have seen a Mayan calendar and it's secret is that it is full of sexy Mayan firemen. I wonder if those same firemen will usher in the impending apocalypse.

At the beginning of the possible end the only thing to do is to celebrate. I did so by DJing a party at Buffalo's finest dive bar, Mohawk Place. While a majority of the clientele were numbing themselves with beer and liquor, I was filling my bladder with sweet, sweet sparkling apple cider. I half expected it to be gross as I purchased it at a markdown store for a single dollar. Sometimes wonderful things come at a minimum price. This was a quality apple cider that actually tasted like cider and not just apple juice. Naturally sweet. Naturally delicious. This is the kind of sparkling cider we should use to shower the firemen when the end is neigh.

I'm here, at work, post Christmas, all alone. I'm surrounded by the soothing sounds of The Best Show Christmas Extravaganza. I am eating chocolate Teddy Grahams, because I am apparently eight. To inverse the ageism of that, I am drinking cough medicine disguised as cranberry lime seltzer water. It does not taste like cranberry or lime and somehow even has a Vicks tang to it. I don't know how it was done as they added water and natural flavors.

I do not have a cough nor do I want one. I do want to know how products like this make it past testing. I know what a cranberry tastes like and this isn't it. I even will go as far as saying that I know what cranberry lime tastes like together and this isn't it. I will say there is lime in there. I have concentrated and discovered lime much like Christopher Columbus laid claim to the pre-discovered land that is America.

I wish I hadn't eaten all of those Teddy Grahams. The eight year old in me wins again.

Ronald Washington Knudsen was a soda fiend, or so the tale goes. The boy drank soda until his teeth began to rot. They literally fell right out of his head. Just turned black, full of holes and plop there they are sitting delicately on his tongue (just typing that makes me want to throw up). With all of his natural teeth rotted away the dentist/barber of the times gave him some dentures. They were made of wood though and if Ronald drank anything too sugary they would simply begin to dissolve. As a result he started carbonating some straight up fruit juice so that he could still drink bubbly beverages. He had some up and some downs with his experiments. One thing that cannot be disputed is that he struck gold with his sparkling apple cider. He took a wholesome down home Western New York style cider and simply added carbonation. It was a little strong and he feared for his wooden teeth so he added just a touch of water to even it out. The result was perfection in liquid form. Folks around his area were known to drink whole bottles at a time, even though he claimed each bottle was three servings. There were happy taste buds, happy stomachs, happy drinkers and most importantly happy teeth. It was a Christmas miracle.

Please, please, give me something to drink.

Excuse me?

I've been stuck in a desert for four days and need something. I'm dying over here. Give me something, anything.

Dude, I would love to but I just finished my water and all I have left is this half eaten can of Chef Boyardee spaghetti.

I'll take it, please. As I previously mentioned, I'm dying over here.

Alright, alright. Jeez. Here. I was going to eat it but you clearly are hungrier than me. You're also way more inconsiderate than me to approach me on my front porch asking for my unfinished lunch on this, the day of my daughters wedding.

Was that a line from the Godfather? Are you quoting Hollywood as I'm sitting here?

"Dying," I know, I know. Here, take it. I've got another can in the house. You can sit down if you'd like.

Thanks. I'll just drink this. Hey, this isn't that refreshing. I mean, I drank the whole thing, but it's not terribly quenching. Do you have anything else while you're in there?

Yeah. I've got a juice box from Sandora. Do you want that?

Sure, thanks. Oh, it even comes with a little straw. This is like elementary school. Oh, dude. What are you doing to me?! This tastes exactly like five minutes ago when I drank your spaghetti. Do you only keep things in the house that taste like spaghetti or tomatoes?

No, you just caught me when I was eating spaghetti and wanted to get rid of this foreign drink. You came to my house and then you took half my lunch. I don't owe you anything, dude.

I guess you're right friend. Well, in retrospect, I wish I had asked you for a glass of water. Drinking both of those things was stupid. I don't feel like I'm going to die and for that I thank you, but I wish that I had just asked for water. I feel like I couldn't have made a worse choice. Thanks, brother. I'll never forget you for saving my life.

You're welcome. If you'd like to come in and split this can of spaghetti with me, you can.

Stop eating spaghetti out of a can.

'Round these parts, we call it "Spicy Water." That's the water you make with your carbonation machine and just don't add flavor. I'm talking about that pop machine that looks like a penguin that makes pop for you when you want it in cool, 1 liter bottles. My girlfriend always gets "soda water with lemon" which is just carbonated water. It's strange though. I drink water all of the day and enjoy it but once it's carbonated, it gets a bit of a gnarly taste to it. She loves the stuff. I don't know what her problem is. I sneak sips periodically and find it quite vile.

I knew what I was in for when I tried this and was actually proven a little bit wrong. It's got that strange bitterness or whatever goes on inside carbonated water, but the pomegranate taste is great. This is actually a drink that has no sugar or carbs or anything, tastes fruity, and for some might be quenching. I made a little face after every sip, but, as previously mentioned, I don't fancy “fancy water.” I do like flavored waters, which would basically be this sans "spice" but this is a world apart from a drink like Hint or equivalent.

When my mom reads this, she's going to be sore at me because she loves seltzer water, too. Seltzer water used to only be used for clowns but now it's used for clowns and moms. I'm not going to draw any lines comparing the two, but you can.

This should be something I love. Over the past year or so I've fallen in love with low sugar "dry" sodas. They provide the bubbles and the flavors that I need without being anything more than liquefied sweetener. The thing is I think that a very small amount of sugar may be needed when drinks are carbonated. I still don't understand it after 32 years on this planet; if you drink a glass of water it's cool refreshing and tasty (in a tasteless kind of way), but if you take that same water and carbonate it the flavor changes. It acquires this taste that is borderline bitter. Is it the CO2 that I taste? I can only assume it is, and it can ruin drinks for me. If that added taste wasn't there this drink would be perfect. It has a light pear taste and there is a nice mellow ginger aftertaste. This is the kind of drink that you could enjoy after a nice meal. It's just too bad that I can't get over the "seltzer water" taste it has. Seriously, if this were uncarbonated I would probably be raving about it. Dear taste buds, please start liking the taste of unsweetened carbonated water. There is a world of drinks out there that are way better for us that we are just not enjoying because of it.

Fizz Ed, the oddly punctuated and spaced, past tense of the verb "fizz" or "to fizz" is the title of this drink. "Dude, I was so fizzed last night after I drank all that pop." for example.

I have known many people to have gotten "fizzed" at parties. I'm pretty sure Derek drank like eighty ounces of pop one night. That, to me, makes we want to research a respectful and affordable dentist, and get my teeth checked out as I haven't had a dentist for about five years, and before that, it was my pediatric dentist. I'm pathetic, I know, but hey, he's got all my records and knows my teeth. I am quite sure that he would jump out the window of his dental practice, which wouldn't do much as it's on the ground floor, if he found out that I did this website and drank so much junk all of the days.

This would be a great drink if you were sick because it's fruity and doesn't taste too different from cough syrup. It's doesn't have a bad taste, but it does have a bit of a syrupy, thick texture to it. Drinks shouldn't have a texture unless it's blatant, like a chia seed drink, or an aloe, or anything with Nata De Coco, or something along those lines.

I wonder what my dentist is up to and if I am still the oldest person that goes there. I know it's wrong that a twenty nine year old man-boy is going to a child's dentist. Sure, I don't care as much about the balloon animals and don't care at all about the stickers and my mouth has grown beyond the kid's toothbrushes, too. I know it's got to be better than adult dentists, though. At least I can learn about cool things like pistachio trees in Highlights magazine in my dentist and I don't have to read magazines like "Time" or "People".

Ahh cascading ice. Nothing tastes better than a nice avalanche rushing over a citrus orchard. A nice, giant ice dam covering all of Florida and pulling forth all the natural juices from oranges and lemons sounds delicious. Mother nature doing her job. Moving millions of tons of ice downward, squeezing juices from fruits to make crisp, cool, fresh water.

If that were the case, awesome, but there is one more step to make this drink do what it's supposed to do and that's to be carbonated. I suppose, at some state, man has to come in, bottle it, and put it on shelves. Using the previous scenario, all would happen as described, then man would break off chunks of this citrus ice into clean wheelbarrows, take them to the carbonation factory where they carbonate whatever is poured into "the hole" and then it bottles it and it's off the consumers everywhere.

The result? An unsweetened Sprite. People, it is just seltzer water with orange and lemon. I guess it would be like an unsweetened Ski. Wait, does Ski have lime or lemon? Now I don't remember.

Does the rest of the country/world outside of the northeastern United States have any idea what real apple cider is like? I just realized that I'm pretty sure it's a regional drink. I mean if you don't live near apple orchards then you're not going to have proper cider. I feel bad for everyone else now, because cider is one of the big reasons to go on living. I have no qualms with apple juice, but it really will never step out of the shadow of cider. I don't know what causes the change in greatness, and I don't want to know because I'd like to believe it's magic.

Grower's Best did do...well their best to create a cider that would have a longer life span. You see real cider only lasts maybe two weeks before it starts to "turn." Then it becomes alcoholic, and then even grosser; vinegar. The taste of this falls somewhere between a traditional cider and plain apple juice. It's be best pasteurized cider I've ever had but it still doesn't compare to the beverage I know and love. Nice try Grower's Best, but I just don't think what you're trying to do it possible.

My grandparents had a small apple orchard in their back yard. I loved apples. When I was a kid they were my absolute favorite. As a result whenever I was visiting them and apples were ripe I would gather up as many as I could and devour apple and apple until I got sick. I was a dumb kid. I liked the game of seeing how many I could eat. The best part about their orchard was that they were all green and yellow apples. As much as I love apples I would pick one of those over any red apple any day. I tip my hat to Juicy Juice for going the uncommon route and using green apples in their sparkling juice. This could have turned out just like any other sparkling apple juice, but they mixed things up a bit and I thank them for that.

There is something strange about carbonating green apples. They almost get a sour apple candy taste to them. At first sip I was disappointed because I thought it was sour apple candy flavored. Then I remembered it was juicy juice and they don't add sugar. After a couple of more sips I was completely on board. It is slightly sour, but then again so are green apples. The aftertaste specifically really tastes like you just at an apple. So far, this is my favorite in this line.

You don't need to celebrate only good things. You can celebrate when bad things stop, or apologies. I guess those are good things, but it's not like, "Sally got a raise! Let's celebrate." I'm talking about things like "The dog stopped peeing on the carpet. Cause to celebrate." or, in my case, yesterday was a rough one. My boss yelled at me. Yeah, I was to blame, but it was the client that was making unrealistic demands and calling him every ten minutes saying, "Why doesn't this work? Why doesn't that work?" Literally, every ten minutes for five hours. If it wasn't such a high-power client, we would tell them what's what, but because of that, I felt the brunt of his rage.

I tried to make it up to him, which I think was successful, by buying him a doughnut and letting him celebrate with me about it not being yesterday. After five minutes of trying to get the G.D. cork off, we got it and it was bottoms up.

Taste? Fruity, but it didn't have a certain sharpness that I like in my non-alcoholic champagne. I know, I know. I'm hardly a connoisseur, but I've had my share of celebratory celebrations and I've had my share of faux champagne. It's got great flavor, as I mentioned, and is just right for two people to celebrate something like a dental cleaning, B on a science test, or good meal.

Anything fermented, for me, gets me a little standoffish. I have to read labels a lot to see if there alcohol in things because I won't touch it if it does. Non-alcoholic mouthwash, white wine vinegar, and vodka sauces are all off limits. We don't review types of kombucha because it's fermented to the point of containing alcohol.

I am not "afraid" of alcohol, I just don't need it in my life and if I have to do a little reading to ensure that I'm not getting any, I'll do it. You read for things like calories and fat, why can't I read for ingredients? You're right, I can. Thank you for your permission.

This stated that it contained no alcohol and I know that Jay wouldn't buy me something with alcohol in it, much like I wouldn't buy him something with beef tallow or gelatin, regardless of how much I try and convince him that I don't think that it's made from hooves anymore. We're more civilized than that...cutting of hooves and using them for jellybeans. It's just barbaric. There's synthetic everything else, why not this. Whatever. Different discussion.

CasCal makes this drink and it is dry and it is for adults. It tastes fermented and although I don't know who is into this thing, but it's there and it's nicely bottled which means that it's in demand. I was really excited when Jay gave this to me because I thought it was going to be some sort of carbonated, licorice infused apple juice. Instead, it tastes like old apple cider. I don't get any anise. Is it my untrained tongue? Possibly, but I know what anise tastes like and I didn't get any out of this. As the temperature increased to room temperature, I liked it more. It wasn't so...cold beer.

I wouldn't write CasCal off entirely as I'm sure they have other flavors that sound good and probably taste totally different. This one was simply not for me.

I wasn't aware of it, but apparently the morning is the most tropical time of day. It's all citrus, sunshine and wild boars. One should embrace the tropical morning with both hands because before you know it time has passed and you are then stuck in the arctic evening with nothing but whale blubber and raw fish. So celebrate the morning while you have it. Wake up early to get the most of the sun and compliment your morning ritual of fake Cinnamon Toast Crunch with some healthy juice. You see juice was made for the morning. Avoid the garbage that has tons of sugar and artificial junk added and go for the all-natural 100% juice. It's also best to keep your morning juice tropical. R.W. Knudsen had their scientists work up the perfect blend to make the most of the morning. It's a mixture of pineapple, papaya, orange, peach and apple juice. It tastes great and makes you feel good about yourself. Even though it is full of citrus fruits the mixture does something too it that takes away the acidic harshness. This makes me want to eat a second breakfast, just to properly have a second glass.

The first couple of sips of this I absolutely hated it. It's not its fault though. Let me lay it out for you. I love water. Seriously love it. For as much garbage as I drink for Thirsty Dudes, I drink at least 5x more water. The thing is something happens to the glory of water when you carbonate it. The simple act of adding air bubbles changes the flavor in a way that I wish it didn't. What can't carbonated water taste just like regular water, but make you burp? I really want that.

So I took a couple of sips, got kind of grossed out and put it in the fridge because I didn't feel like writing a review. Cut to a couple of days later I came home from band practice and decided to finish off the bottle. At first it was still gross, but the more I drank the more I became acclimated to it. I'm in no way a huge fan of it, but for a style of drink that I don't like, they did a good job with it.

One thing I find odd is that instead of flavoring it with a little bit of juice they used fruit oils. I guess that way there is zero sugar in this.