Mike Literman - 1759 Reviews

You know. It's a juice.

Wild blueberry. Is that different than a "regular" blueberry? I feel like you could add adjectives to anything and as long as it's not "wrong," it's right. "Well you do find them in the wild so they are technically wild blueberries. LOLZ." Farmers. Whatever, dudes.

This is fine. I didn't expect much as it's a Stevia juice with low calories. They kind of take the form of a fruit flavored sugar after a while. This doesn't taste bad but it hardly tastes like any blueberry I've ever tasted and I've been known to eat a blueberry every now and then. At ten calories per bottle though, I cannot and will not complain. This is actually a decent drink that met my expectations and allowed me to happily drink while not knowing if I was going to have some sort of caloric overload or sugar high, neither of which I want.

This is half wonderfully punishing and half reminiscent of my jobs as a dishwasher. That's where I place it. The lemon ,oh, dat lemon. I don't know where this lemon flavor is from but it does not taste like real lemon. If it's real, I guess I don't know what real lemon taste like. As for the cayenne, I am from Buffalo and my roots are in cayenne. This is a welcomed punch in the tongue. Ever since Jay and I got rightfully reamed out by the guys as Prometheus Springs, we have grown to love and appreciate a nice, spicy drink. This being a water drink, though, has its chuggability diminished by the fact your mouth would be increasingly on fire. Being from where I am, though, this is actually good. Take a little sip. Get a little burn. Take a big gulp. Get a big burn. Swish it around. There's that tingle you want. Am I a masochist? Nope. Do I like a good runny nose when I eat spicy food? Yes I do.

The lemon did take some getting used to but was it awful? No. It wasn't. It just took my taste buds for a loop. It might have been the spice that threw it off. I don't know. I have another one at home that I look forward to drinking. Maybe I'll give it to my kids when they're bothering me. Was that Hint's intention? I don't care. Hint didn't know that they were going to trash their room again and expect me to clean it up did they? Some people spank their kids. I might just choose to give them secretly spicy drinks when they're not listening to their G.D. dad after he asked them to feed the dog four G.D. times.

Oh, and I don't know why there is caffeine in there. Do people need caffeine in their water?

I drink one cup of coffee per day. I do not need it. I don't know why I do it. I might think I'm an adult but I could throw a baseball in any direction and have five people say that I am a fraud of a man.

This drink. I didn't know that it was vanilla as I graciously pulled it off the shelf. I did when I unwrapped it and then again as I drank it. The vanilla doesn't kill the drink and, if anything it smooths it out like any good, self-respecting vanilla would do. I don't know if there was milk in it but it could have been the vanilla that made it have that smoothness. They were spot on with their "Not Too Sweet" title, too because it's not tooth gratingly sweet. All of this while still retaining a good coffee flavor. All wrapped up in a nice little package.

One thing to note is that they must be making a hell of a concentrate to start off with. They tout a ten hour brew which is fourteen hours shorter than the cold brew I make and arguably as strong. They might be up to something in that facility. Take note. Sorcery perhaps?

Surprisingly after all this time we have only reviewed two Nestea drinks on this site. While not terribly surprising, they have put out decent things in the past and this should be added to the list assuming that you like rooibos. More about that in a second.

As I've said before, if I had it my way, I would just drink unsweetened tea for the rest of my life. Sugar is great but since I've been winding down in my reviews, I find it harder and harder to drink full sugar drinks like tea and pop. This was a nice treat at "slightly sweet." That I can deal with.

The black tea doesn't really shine and that strange/foreign rooibos takes its place. While I don't hate rooibos, its taste takes some getting used to. It seems fruitier and strangely darker than a black tea. Having drunk black tea pretty exclusively, it's a new flavor I'm just not accustomed to. It's absolutely not bad and I would actually put it in the "good" category. It was truly "slightly sweet" which I appreciated them sticking to their guns on.

I would like to try the black slightly sweet tea that they make. That might be a nice little number. Until I find it, though, I will try its older, more sophisticated, curmudgeonly unsweetened brethren.

I think if Thirsty Dudes could have one sponsor it would be Big Lots. I believe that I speak for both Jay and myself when I say that for drinks, it's a great place. They never have the same thing and you could go once a month and find new stuff. It's not the best stuff, sure. It's not the most high end stuff, sure. Sometimes you find a lot of the same stuff but anything that's there a lot is truly and undeniably garbage at best. Recently they've been getting some nicer stuff though like Bruce Cost, Illy and Belvoir. Maybe they know we're going there.

This last time I went with my brother who has never "Thirsty Dude'd" with me and he just watched as I nonchalantly knocked drink after drink into my handcart. This being one of them and I'm glad I did because it's pretty darn good. Somehow the lime does cut through and ruin everything. The watermelon flavor was light and first followed by the lime. They're also doing a good job at taming their array of sweeteners because it no longer tastes like Stevia threw up in your mouth. It's also in a nice, small can so you don't get overwhelmed by the flavor. It's sweet. Not too sweet but I think anything larger than this there would be remainders.

Big Lots, if you're listening, we're accepting offers.

Gene Simmons of Gene Simmons Toyota has released his own line, AKA signed the rights to his name, to a pop company. Is the pop any good? Is a Toyota Corolla purchased from Gene Simmons Toyota any good? Yeah, it's fine. It's root beer. Much like a Corolla, it's fine. It does what it's supposed to do and does it well. It isn't exceptional but it's reliable. I didn't know that the pop game was so large that just anyone could say, "Oh, I have the chance to make a million dollars so I'm going to stamp my reputable and honorable name on the line so people can drink my pop."

Would I drink this again. Yes. Was it good. Yes. Would I buy a car from him? Eh, why not. Some root beer is good and some root beer is great. This root beer was good but, like a Corolla, a good root beer is a dime a dozen.

Sometimes you want a nice, dark cola. Most times, if I want cola, it's that. I used to drink diet cola. I think it was when my mom would only order us diet. You know, the 90's, when it was alright for kids to eat and drink anything at any time with no worries about disease or whatever. We played outside in the dirt where we belonged. Dirty dirt kids.

This is a nice alternative to those of you, like my manager(?) and mother-in-law who pretty exclusively drink diet Coke and might like a nice change but keep that same toxic diet flavor. This isn't terrible, alright. It's not. It's still most certainly diet. Unavoidably diet. The blood orange flavor is not super strong and certainly not strong enough to overcome that of the aspartame. It's more of like a "citrus diet Coke" than an explicit or definite flavor. I, for one, would not get it again but then again I am not the target demographic.

I bought another flavor of these that I am not not looking forward to drinking. Does that sell it at all? I regretfully drank this while regretfully doing my taxes. What a night. My mid-30's are garbage.

Well this was a pleasant surprise. I dropped my son off at school and his teacher said, "Are you ready for the planetarium?" which reminded me that I didn't make him a lunch like a pile of crap dad. That being said, of the top three things that I dislike doing in life, making school lunch, a task that takes no longer than five minutes is one of them. Putting dishes away, another job that takes five minutes is also there if you're counting.

What does any good dad do when he didn't make his son a lunch? Go to the closest store and buy a turkey and cheese sub and some fruit and a juice. What does he do if he's a Thirsty Dude? Look around for drinks he hasn't reviewed wasting precious time that he doesn't have. That's what. I found this and thought that it might be alright and I've really been sleeping on making cold brew this week. I thought wrong. It's actually great. It's got a great cocoa taste and a great coffee taste. It's not too sweet and everything has their chance to shine. There is milk in it but it's neither milky nor chalky. This is the cold brew I wish I could make at home. This is fantastic.

What a way to kick off a ten degree day; a nice little black tea with some citric citrus going on up in there. It's all very lightly sweetened and lightly flavored and comes together into a nice lil' package. The black tea is a light to medium brew and the Valencia just an "orangish" flavor. I'm no orange connoisseur so it's "just" orange to me. It unfortunately doesn't come in a gallon jug because I could sit here and drink it all day. Sure I got it across the street from where I work but it took me an hour to drink this. If I'm at work for eight hours and this cost me around $2.50, that's going to cost me a Jackson per day. There are better ways to spend your money.

I was worried about this. I split it with a dude at work and warned him that this would be strong and wildly caffeinated. I was wrong. It's got me a little jittery, which is fine, but some of the other cold brew I have drank got me lit up. It also is not hard to drink. I have said many a time that I drink coffee like a child would, with chocolate syrup in it but for this review, I went straight. It was not bad at all. I spent an hour and a half in my car due to snow so it wasn't as cold as it could have been but not docking that, it was good. I would say that this being just a medium coffee with average caffeine makes it something I could easily and have easily made at home.

All that being said, a little carton of black cold brew is a nice thing to just be able to pick up and go.

The time is 9:03 AM. A half hour ago I drank Mountain Dew. If someone wants to drive me to an insane institution, I will happy enter myself into the system for a solid week. I could use it. This, friends, is a dumb product. It's Code Red with a "holiday blend." This tastes like a weaker Code Red. Maybe with more citrus. Nothing specifically "holiday" or "festive" about it, though. No cinnamon or nutmeg or bits of leaves or anything reminiscent of any sort of holiday flavors. What is the point of this? At least Pepsi Christmas or Holiday or Festive or whatever that is called has some sort of "holiday spice" to it. This is basically just Code Red "watered down" with 7-Up or something. Dumb. Way to go, America. You've been poisoned again by Mountain (Mitten) Dew.

Yep. Here's another great one. When I drink coffee, it's cold and has chocolate in it. This checks all those boxes. It's pretty smooth because it's got half and half in there, too. I typically wouldn't put cream in my coffee but let me tell you this, if someone served this to me as-is while I was lying scantily clad on the lido deck of a cruise ship, I would say, thank you, and tip him an appropriate amount of money. I'm no monster. A tip is not a tip unless it meets the criteria of "enough." Having never worked in a tip-reliant industry unless you count playing in a band that is willing to but doesn't receive tips, I don't know what it's like to get a bad, good or great tip.

Here's a tip (segue) buy yourself some of this. It's smooth and still has a great coffee flavor even with the cream and chocolate. Be a little childish. You like coffee like you like your men? I don't know how to get out of this. I'm in a corner now. I'll stay here for a while. At least I have this coff...and it's gone.

For a drink that expired six years ago from the Ukraine, this sexy pear drink wasn't too bad.

It's been a while since I've had some Ski. This tastes almost like a cherry limeade but without the "fancy" title. It has a decent cherry taste and then there is the mystery "citrus" flavor that twists it a little bit. I let a dude at work try it and he liked it so by all means that means that it can't be that bad.

There is not much to say. Honestly it's just a cherry pop. I wish I could make up a whimsical story about a dog saving a bird from a shark but I don't have it in me.

Woah. Talk about a dense drink. Have you ever considered a drink to be "dense." I feel that "thick" is boring. "Rich" is also quite used if you ask me. This drink is dense. Heavy. Dude who I let try it perfectly described it as a "non-dairy creamer." It's as if you were a college kid who had one for a split second, like you found $20 on the street and decided to shoot for the stars and buy some fancy coffee creamer, got home, realized that you should have spent it on coffee and have nothing to drink but the creamer itself.

I did add this to some cold brew coffee and it was good. This claims that it was "cold brew" and although I cannot argue as I wasn't in the room as this was being made, it kind of defeats the point when you are sacrilegiously adding almond and toffee juice to it. That's also coming from someone who can only drink coffee cold and with some form of chocolate or mocha flavoring like an idiot child. This is fine if you were a child but if you were a child you wouldn't like it because it's coffee and kids don't like coffee so who is this for? This is for people that add twelve sugars to their coffees as barely functioning adults.

Birch beer is fantastic. Let's get this. Well this doesn't taste like birch beer. It doesn't smell like it. It doesn't taste like it. This is probably (zero research, friends) the birch equivalent of maple water but doesn't tastes like you strained it through some tasty flapjacks.

Brass tacks. This is water, bruh. It's water with a hint of something you will never know what it is. I promise. It tastes like nothing. It smells like nothing. I could have been had with this drink as far as I know. Is it bad? Well that depends. Are you one of those idiots that thinks water is gross? If so, come on, dude. Grow up. Juice is terrible for you. Learn a book you dummy. Juice is just a cheating way to get kids to drink more water. You're 32. Drink water and eat your vegetables.

What in the hell is this? It's been a while since I've drank something this disgusting. This is 100% medicine. The Stevia, of which I am typically fine with is wildly overpowering and sticks with you for what feels like an eternity. The acai, of which I am not a huge fan of, tastes like a poorly under-mixed syrup concentrate. There is no ginger flavor regardless of it being the second ingredient. The sugar is nauseatingly sweet and overpowers and ruins just about everything. It's been a while for me friends, but this drink gets the lowest rating we give here at Thirsty Dudes. I wish I had a toothbrush.

Shawn, what did you do to this iced tea? Did you pour me a glass of iced tea, drink half of my glass, look in the fridge, realize there was no more tea and then refill my glass with water? You didn't? This was purchased like this? This is how you bought this? Look me in my eyes and tell me that this was unaltered and went from bottle to glass. Really? Who made this? Arizona? The company that has historically made decent tea that we all grew up with? Really? Well, that disappoints me. I am disappointed. This actually sucks. Shawn, you let me down. Not as much as Arizona has but this blows and it's your fault. Do better.

Fall is upon us. What does that mean? Cinnamon. Ahh, cinnamon. Natures...cinnamon. I bought this because it was A: Cheap and B: Had a great selling line on the side which I will put here:

This creamy and sweet cinnamon cold brew coffee is big on taste with a warm, velvety texture.

So's I buy it, bring it in to work and have two dudes try it and the consensus is as follows: It's bad. Not even OK. It's not good. It tastes like someone made a passable cold brew and then dumped too much ground cinnamon in it, said to themselves, "Welp, no turning back now." put in one more pinch, and bottled it up.

The coffee is fine. I don't drink too much and what I do drink is cold brew and typically has some sort of disgusting chemical chocolate taste to it so I'm not one to judge but this coffee was light at best. The cinnamon was a ground cinnamon and not a candy cinnamon. After tasting it, though, I don't know which I would have preferred. Thumbs down, Archer Farms/Target. There's more to fall than cinnamon. There's more to you than bad cold brew. I feel like I just masochistically did "the cinnamon challenge" to myself. I feel like a moron.

What is happening outside?! It's the last week of September and it's in the upper 80's. I'm walking with some dudes from work, maybe or maybe not playing Pokemon Go and just sweating, bro. Sweating. Neck, all pits, belly button. Sweaty.

What better way to quench the sweaty mess you have become than some classic Arizona Green Tea? Oh, you made more money than you did as a 35 year old than you did when you were twenty? Spend the extra dollar and get the "Good Brew" iced tea. It's the same flavor with none of the corn syrup or preservatives that you remember. It has more of that green tea bitterness that you have been losing the past fifteen years by dropping the corn syrup so it tastes less like lies than before. Not insultingly bitter like your crappy aunt (by marriage) but bitter like you would expect a green tea to be.

You can't pick your family. They just come with you or with whomever you're with. You can pick your teas, though and this is a wise decision over the classic tallboy. As nostalgic as it might be, this is pretty unarguably better. Children might disagree but they're dumb. Someone had to say it.