Sugar - 840 Reviews

Hey Jak! It's you and me buddy. Let's go for a ride, and by ride I mean via horseback, because due to your name, Red Jak, you are obviously a cowboy. So let's see what these dusty trails have to offer us.

Well it seems that you ride a donkey Jak. I say that because you taste like a drink for children, and that is what children ride on the prairie. Energy drinks for children. That is probably one of the worst ideas ever. I feel like their little hearts wouldn't be able to handle it. Perhaps their tiny veins are too delicate and they would just burst. I don't want to think about these things. Kids stay away from energy drinks. You're young. You naturally have all the energy you need.

To clarify I'm not saying Big Red targets this product towards children, but it tastes like they would love it. It doesn't taste like ten thousand chemical Smarties. It tastes like a berry-flavored soda that is heavy on the strawberry. It reminds me of those Asian gums that come in little boxes with four gumballs. They are really fluffy. I love that gum.

There you have it. Jak's donkey is all tuckered out and won't leave the troth. I on the other hand am carrying my horse around because I'm all amped up from the drink.

When I was in college, I had a friend called Chad. Chad worked for Student Associates, which basically meant if there was a promo going on from an outside company, he would be on of the people to work it. Handing out products and flyers and just doing promotion was his gig. Kind of like a hired street team, if you are familiar with that term, a term which I feel died out as soon as people started spending time online on Facebook and Twitter and not on the streets where things used to happen.

One of the companies that he did stuff for was Starbucks. They had him handing out cases of their new Frappuccino in the smallest possible containers. Those lil' baby 4oz containers like V8 comes in. 4 ounces? Am I a child? Nay, I am a man who wears child sized clothing.

So Chad took a case of the stuff and gave it to my roommate, Evan, and I and we didn't know where to start, so we decided to just jump head first into the case and destroyed about half that first day, got sick, and struggled to finish the second half.

This Illy Latte Macchiato tastes a lot like that but less sweet and more coffee taste. It's teetering on the edge of my dislike for coffee and my like for coffee tasting things. It's pretty good. There is just the right amount of sugar to offset the otherwise strong coffee taste. I think this is a good product for people like me that don't hate the taste of coffee in things, but don't like coffee itself, all the way up to coffee lovers.

Good job, Illy. You've got a huge market.

Long meetings. You spend all day at an office and sometimes it's alright. You've got your little desk and it's done up the way that you like and sometimes you can listen to music there. At my desk, I don't listen to metal because there are others around and the others wouldn't appreciate it. No, not like the movie "The Others," which was one of the most awful movies I've ever seen, next to "Bats" of course. I mean, come on. Nothing happened in the whole movie and even the payout was just discovery of nothing. Ugh, Nicole Kidman, you're the pits.

Long meetings. I'll start again. Nothing can save you short of a car hitting your building or someone smoking in the stairwell, which sets off the smoke alarms which means that the fire department come and evacuate the entire building. Since neither of these happen, I needed something. A guava juice is the perfect escape from reality and I was lucky enough to have one in cache.

I enjoyed this drink in all its gritty goodness. As I've said previously, I don't know what Maaza does to their drinks but they're right on the fence between nectar and juice and I don't want them to move. It has a great guava taste. Pretty sweet, but the flavor was on.

Since I'm writing this and I'm (usually) not a disrespectful jerk all the time, I am out of the meeting writing it, so I finally got out, but unless a meal is provided, there should be no such thing as a three and a half hour meeting. FACT!

Greg's got a sweet tooth. I love it. I drink a lot of drinks with sugar in it, but it's never sweet enough. Rumor has it, and you could probably ask to confirm, that he once lined up Cadbury Creme Eggs and ate three, one after another. He was the person I had in mind when I brought this drink in. I have been holding on to it for just the right time and today, this dreary, spring day.

I gave it to Greg to try first and with the blink of an eye, half of the bottle was gone. He must have been jonesing for something sweet. I did mention that I brought something in for him, and when I presented him with this, his little mouth probably started working. He had a good "woah" face on when he tried it, which means that it's good. I gave it a whirl, liked it a lot, gave it to Zack to try and he said that it tastes like "liquid Rolo's" which I don't think that I could top in a description, so I won't.

I let Greg finish the rest of the bottle, which he promptly and swiftly did. I think he liked it, and I think that he thinks that you would, too. Take a trip north to Canada, get a little bottle, and share it with your friends because it's got a heart-stopping amount of calories for one person to commit to.

With a name like "Buckin' Root Beer", I was fully expecting this to have a lot of bite. I like that in a root beer. The more bite, the better. Or maybe the folks at Jackson Hole want me to drink this on the back of a bull at a rodeo? I have a feeling that isn't the case, as I'd probably wear more of the bottle than what I could manage to drink.

I've been saving this root beer for a week now. Was it worth the wait? Very much so! This is a really heavy root beer, but it also has lots of flavors. As I suspected, this has a good amount of bite to it, with a really nice anise taste. It just gets better and better with every sip, unlike some sodas which lose flavor as the bottle goes down. The bottle says that this is batch brewed, and I must say that this is a great batch!

I drink a lot of aloe beverages. I love them, and I've never had one I didn't enjoy. I've also had an aloe dessert cup from an Asian market, which was great. Taking that into consideration when I was out walking around and I saw an aloe plant I decided to break off a leaf and eat it. Big mistake. Even though every aloe based product I've consumed has been sweet and delicious this was incredibly bitter and it tasted like uncut poison. Oh you didn't know you cut poison? You don't watch many movies do you. You have to poison people slowly so it goes undetected. If you don't you'll end up in "the hut." So it was foul and I hated myself for letting it touch my tongue. In order to feel better I realized I needed to renew my faith in aloe so I picked this up. It's pretty standard with the exception that Family uses real fruit juices in their drinks. The chunks are average size and there are plenty of them. It tasted like a mellow mango juice with pulp. Good times.

This is Lipton's new "100% Natural" line and I've got to say, bravo. This is actually 100% natural. It has a great flavor and is good for you. I have seen this on sale as of late at top retailers like Target and I hope that it catches on. I have given credit before to Lipton for doing things right for a "big guy". It seems that when companies get larger, they focus more on profits and making things cheaper rather than making a quality product like they used to. Lipton has brought it back around with this and the TrueLeaf stuff, which I absolutely love. With the added sweetness of Stevia, this is a current product with everyone in mind. Everyone can deal with this large bottle clocking in at only 130 calories. This is a lot of tea. It also has a good green tea taste. It's entry level, but good. It's not as harsh as a traditional tea, but it's easily approachable. My mom got this for me for Easter and I think that it's hard to find stuff that I haven't drank, but she found this and I thank her for this.

Mom and Lipton; thank you both. I see that there are a lot more flavors out there for me to try and that pleases me.

I didn't know what to expect with this. Upon first sip, it tasted like soymilk with an extra flavor to it. Then Monet reminded me of the mung bean dessert balls you get at Thai or sushi restaurants. That is EXACTLY what this tastes like. Even though we followed Jason's instructions to shake this prior to opening, the tapioca balls still stayed at the bottom. The tapioca balls are much smaller and less chewy than those I'm used to in bubble tea. Sadly, these would not be as effective if you were to spit them.

POG is one of the best drinks I've had from Hawaii. It's fruity and sweet in all the right ways. When I saw they had an offshoot called POG Power I thought I might have the world's most delicious energy drink on my hands. Like many times in my life I was wrong. Not in the flavor department, but in the fact that this is not an energy drink at all. It is in fact a sports drink. It's kind of like Gatorade and POG combined, except it's more flavorful than the prior. It's pretty good, but I see no reason for it when you can just be drinking the original POG.

If a poll was taken across the islands of Hawaii to determine what the state juice would be I'm pretty sure POG would be announced the winner of the silver medal. If you thought that it would get the gold then you my friend forgot about a little thing called the pineapple. Can anything really compete with the pineapple on Hawaii? If it ran I'm sure it would win the office of governor for the state. It has that much power.

Enough about pineapple, it has no place in this drink. Here the other Hawaiian fruits reign supreme. Passion fruit, orange and guava run this game. Sweet. Fruity. Refreshing. (On a side note I ate a guava straight from a tree yesterday and that was enough to make me want to move my entire life to the islands.) The carton tells a story of the Poflodytes, Furry little creatures that gather the fruit and make the juice. I believe this is a cover up created by the POG company so that people won't realize that all of their labor is provided by the obscene amount of feral cats that wander the islands. If you ever think you see a Poglodyte take a closer look and you will see the zipper on their costumes. Beware though. The chickens are not what they seem.

I made it to Hawaii alive. I was surprisingly not too miserable after 17 hours of traveling. To help refuel myself I drank a pineapple smoothie that was pretty astounding. Then I hit up a grocery store for rations for the week. I found a couple bottles of this aloe that is made in Hawaii. Pretty great, right? Want to know what's better? I realized there are huge aloe plants everywhere around here, and I'm going to attempt to eat it fresh.

This was very good. Average style chunks, with a strong aroma of honey. The honey flavor was also way stronger than I expected, which was nice. It's always great to find "irregular" flavors of aloe.

It's been a hard day is New Jersey. Your wife has been nagging you to quit your job at the pizza place, your kids have been getting in trouble at school and your Honda CRX needs new tires. I know!! Sure they're $30 a piece and you know a guy who can get them cheaper than that because they fell off a truck. Honestly, that guy must just drive behind trucks all day, ready to jump out at a moment's notice in case something falls off. I've never been behind a truck that dropped anything. My friend Ian once drove behind a truck and a rocking chair came out of the back and within a week, a sheet a drywall fell out and he said that it exploded. That must have been awesome. So you've had a hard day. You come home and...oh seriously...the cable is out? You thought you paid it? Yeah, they probably messed up, not you. So what's a boy to do? Open up that fridge baby and grab out some officially licensed product from your and my dad's favorite show, The Sopranos. It hits so close to home. You drove the same streets as those glorious gangsters. They've got family and you've got a family. You love the movie "The Godfather" and they do, too. Same wavelength.

This HBO created show which has won so many awards has created an equally award winning drink, and I wouldn't use that phrase lightly. Myself, not being one who drinks, doesn't know what actual Chianti tastes like, really enjoyed it. It's a light, fruity flavor and actually has less bite than most Italian soda. It was calm and cool, just like you when your spinning those pies. That's when you're at your best. Throwing pizza in the air with the greatest of ease is what makes you happy. You're good at it and you know it. Don't let your nagging wife or dumb kids let you forget it.

It is over 60 degrees today in Portland and it feels great! The things I love about warm weather are all the delicious cool drinks there are for me to drink to help 'beat the heat'. One of my favorites is lemonade. Now I have had my fair share of lemonades over the years, and Natucket Nectar ranks up near the top. It had been a few years since I had drank a bottle so finding this at the Alberta Co-op today was a treat.

If I had to describe this in three words, it would be 'smooth, tart, and refreshing.' I can't find anything wrong with this. It's the perfect summer time lemonade. The lemon tart is perfect too, not over or underwhelming. Just perfect.

Looks (and preconceived notions) can be deceiving. Thus far, Simpson Spring has output mostly mediocre soda. So when I found this in my box to review I had a feeling it was going to be a very generic root beer. While this isn't the most complex ever, it's far from bland.

The smell threw me off because it didn't smell like run-of-the-mill root beer. It was a familiar smell, but I couldn't put my finger on it. As soon as I took my first sip, it hit me: birch beer. This starts off as a normal root beer, but has a really nice crisp birch beer aftertaste. It's a really good 1-2 combo with a really good bite. Much like the combination of root beer and sarsaparilla, I would have never thought of this pairing but it makes sense. I love it! Now I challenge a company to make a Root Beer-Sarsaparilla-Birch Beer. If there has to be a holy trinity, my vote goes to them!

All I can think of today is pizza. See, Jay, myself, and Thirsty Dudes editor Dan like (scratch that) love to make exotic pizzas. We roll our own dough. We buy all the ingredients. We bake it. Take a picture of it, eat it, and then lay down for a while because it's typically four inches thick. Pizza we've made include but are not limited to General Tzo, Buffalo Chicken, and Thanksgiving. Tonight I don't know what we should make, but after drinking this Pangleheimers ginger ale, I feel like it has to be accompanied by one wicked pizza.

This pop was excellent and just what I needed on such a drab Tuesday. It was just the right amount of sweet and just the right amount of hot to quench my cravings. Also, to those who don't know what "hot" ginger ale, it's spicy ginger ale, not temperature hot. If that were the case, in theory, everything could potentially be hot but would you want it? Seriously? I doubt it. So, anyhow, this funny named ginger ale was good. I would compare it to Blenheim ginger ale.

I wish they sold this by me, as "the team" had to travel to Canada to get it, but it might be worth the trip. The little, what I think is a, Pomeranian is also an adorable spokesperson, too.

I'm not a big fan of fermented drinks. I have never drunk beer, my tongue hates kombucha, and the few fermented soda's I've had so far haven't been so great. Despite this being fermented, I was actually excited to try it due to the flavor. Sadly, the orange taste is not very prominent. It has a strong ginger taste, but not a spicy ginger. As far as ginger drinks go, this is VERY mild. I suppose that would be good for someone liked the taste of ginger but not the spicy part of it. Not me though, up the spice! Once again I am reminded that fermented drinks and I don't go well together.

Welcome back to Canada Week here at Thirsty Dudes. For today's installment we will take a look at some Vintage Soda. There's something about soda in a can that is kind of a turn off. The expectations I had for this were lower than low. I expected a garbage generic soda that was made with cane sugar instead of HFCS. Our neighbors from the north have proved me wrong yet again.

On first sip it tasted like a pretty standard cola. It was better than I expected, but it didn't stand out much. When I went in for another taste there was something else there. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but something special. Back to the trough I went and is that nutmeg I tasted? Upon inspection of the ingredients yes it was, along with it's friends cinnamon, ginger, and cloves. What's that straggling behind? Oh of course it's maple syrup. There's maple syrup in this pop! Canada you really do live in your stereotypes, and I love you for it. If it were legal for me to marry a country I would have you at the alter before you could pick out a proper dress.

I had expected to drink a couple sips of this, review it and dump the rest. It ended up being one of the best colas I've ever had. If it were in a glass bottle I'm positive it would have gotten a full five-bottle review. I just had to hold back because I know it could be just a tad better when served in the right medium.

This was our thousandth review. We needed to do something fun/gross/different for you and we decided to incorporate some significant others, pets, and babies. Watch the video and learn what we thought about Rogers Fizzy Amla with Jeera Masala.

Thank you very much for following us along this partially disgusting, partially delicious, mostly mediocre trip. Now, for your viewing pleasure, have a video review.

Much like Mike who reviewed the last chrysanthemum drink, I was disappointed that this didn't taste like earth. This tastes a lot like the other Famous House drink I had: loaded with sugar and no other taste. There is a slight black tea taste, but it's definitely not prominent. File this one under the "not great, but not horrible" category.

Canada gets the worst rap ever. As a country it is the butt of probably 37% of the worlds jokes. I'm not kidding polls were taken pie charts were made up. This is serious business. I love Canada. I would love to move to Toronto, and I even looked into it at one point, but it wasn't in the cards. I've never had anything but a good time while I'm in the Great White North, and seeing as it's less than 10 minutes from my house, I'm there a good deal. I actually have plans to go to Toronto twice this week. With all of my love for our northern neighbor I never expected an outstanding ginger ale to be one of its exports. I always associate ginger ale with Wisconsin (another incredible place). It's probably because of Vernors. That's made in WI right? Either way this is pretty incredible. It stands high above nearly all other ginger based beverages I have tried. It's full flavored with just the slightest bit of burn. I mean this is a ginger ale and not a beer, so it shouldn't burn too much. It's not overly sweet and it's perfectly carbonated. I will surely look to grab some more of this on one of my Toronto trips.

I salute you Canada for your plentiful maple trees, your noble beavers, your abundance of veggie food and now for your wonderful ginger ale.