Shot - 84 Reviews

Vemma is back with yet another mangosteen based beverage. This time it's a shot for those who are always on the go, and have limited time for nutrition. First off, reevaluate your life people. I know some of the people who don't have time are sincerely working constantly to put food on the table for their families, and I commend them for their efforts. Let's be honest here though, this drink is not for those people. Those people aren't going to throw down their hard earned money for a supplement shot. It seems to me that this drink is marketed towards business folks who are constantly working and deals and such, not those doing nitty gritty manual labor. It's these people who have the option to eat healthy, but instead decide to continue working. If that's what you love in life, who am I to argue, but I personally like to enjoy the life I live and not spend so much time on work that I don't have time to eat a healthy meal. Now, I'm not faulting Vemma for this; these people would exist whether their product was around or not, so why not help them live healthier with their choices?

This is a 2oz shot that is jam packed with vitamins and minerals to help you get through your day in a healthy manner. It's no secret that shots generally taste completely wretched. This though, this has got something going for it. It tastes like mangosteen juice that has had a multivitamin dissolved into it. It's downright pleasant. It's what I would imagine a teenage version of a Flintstone's vitamin would taste like. You know for people who aren't; ready to take on straight up vitamins, but the regular Flintstone ones just seem too juvenile. This is so good in fact that I have been slowly sipping it, instead of slamming it like you normally would a shot. It's nice to have a beverage that is this healthy and tastes this good.

Health Guard is one pushy company. First they were telling everyone to “Be Happy” and now they have their megaphone out yelling “Be Skinny” to the world. I mean it's a bit presumptuous to think you know what is best for everyone and what people want.

I kid. I know Health Guard isn't a militant group forcing people to be skinny and happy, but the “Be” part of their product names conjures a great Gestapo type vision in my mind, and it makes me laugh.

The shtick of this shot is that you drink it about an hour before meals and it helps to suppress your appetite so that you won't gorge yourself, as many of us are prone to do. I believe it's supposed to trick your body into thinking you're full with a burst of pineapple and cranberry fluid.

Let us start with the flavor. It's a shot, so everything tastes concentrated, which is to be expected. The concentrated pineapple and cranberry flavors are about where you would expect them to be, strong and intense. It's a shot, so you're just supposed to down the whole thing in one go, and the function matters more than the flavor. The problem is in the fact that it tastes like it was made with hose water, and then since it was a shot the hose water taste was also concentrated. I know they didn't actually use hose water, but that is what it tastes like and any saving grace that might have been in the flavor is completely out the window at this point.

As far as functionality goes, I downed this shot, and then an hour later I proceeded to eat an entire loaf of French bread in one sitting. I think it's safe to say that it didn't work very well for me. If there would have been more food around I'm pretty sure I would have kept going. Christ, I am a glutton.

Children of the 80's please enter the collective unconscious and conjure the image of Mr. Yuck. His disgusted looking face was once the sign to children of the United States that whatever was contained inside was most certainly poison and would more than likely kill you instantly, so you know…€¦stay away from it.

Like most energy shits, I am completely surprised when Senior Yuck isn't staring up at me from the label artwork. The harshness of this concentrated, fake fruit flavored, sucralose laden shot sure tastes like it should kill me on contact with my bloodstream, but that's the way the game is when you're dealing with energy shots. They are a beverage that are not meant to be ingested for their taste, simply for their long lasting effects. I can assure you that the effects certainly do what they claim, so at least it has that going for it.

Ladies and Gentlemen, a few days ago brought in the summer of 2013. I am pleased, but what I want to know is how the hell did I get a cold in the summer? I'm stuffy, my nose is runny and I feel like garbage. I should be outside frolicking and running through sprinklers or some such thing, instead I'm inside napping and reading.

I know this is more of a precautionary shot, but I'm willing to try anything I have on hand to kick this as soon as possible. This little guy contains noni, mango, pear, apple, lilikoi, goji, pineapple, and acai juice, as well date puree. We got a bunch of these sent to us to review. I had one a couple of days ago, and I just downed it. It tasted like the most concentrated form of a handful of super fruits that I have ever tasted. It was harsh and you could certainly taste the dates. Now as I sit here about to drink another I discover that they suggest mixing it into a glass of water. Well, that makes a lot of sense. When I mix it with water it's much easier to drink and the flavors spread out a bit now that they have room to flourish. It becomes more refreshing and not something you are glad comes in a shot bottle so you can down it nice and quick. It now tastes like something that should be drunk in Hawaii. Perhaps I will get to do that some time.

Update:
Hawiian Ola has updated their formula a bit by adding some pineapple juice in to the mix and it makes a world of a difference. Say “So long” to the harsh bitterness and cuddle up with some tropical fruit flavors. It's a shot, but I would have no problem drinking a full glass of this, well minus the dumb amount of energy I would receive with no outlet for it. Even though I'm sure it's not in any way true I will choose to believe that Mike's review of the original formulation, which can be read below, was directly responsible for the update. We have that kind of pull here at Thirsty Dudes, right?

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Jeez Louise. I have drunk some strong drinks in my day but this might push some unlucky contender out of the top five. Note to the weak tongued, this is one bitter drink. It's like a concentrate of yerba mate and green tea but tastes between a really bitter tea and, for reasons unbeknownst to me, an old coffee taste.

After a while when your amazement and tears subside, you get a little bit of a concentrated fruit taste. There is nothing you want in this drink but because it's a shot, it's like they just want to make it easier for you to get everything you need. I think if you took this tiny bottle and poured it into a proper pint glass and just filled it with water, this might be a pretty good drink. Alone it's pretty gnarly. Not bad, just overpowering of all good things.

To those who say "You can't have too much of a good thing." should drink this and will presumably say, "You know what? Fruit is good but they could have cut back a little bit. These good things were properly too much'd."

I had been seeking this energy shot out for a while but it kept eluding me. Or I would find it when I didn't want an energy shot or didn't have money on me. This went on for months until I had to go to a family function on barely any sleep. My grandparents were being awarded by the city of Tonawanda for doing awesome stuff for the youth (they helped build a skate park among other things). Knowing that I was going to have to talk to family and friends of the family, I wanted to be semi-coherent so I stopped by a drug store to wake myself up. Not wanting to carry around an open can of Monster (seriously, more energy drinks need to come in resealable bottles), I went to the front counter where they keep the energy shots so 14 year old kids don't steal them all. Low and behold, the pink lemonade shot was there!

Now in the past, energy shots are usually borderline undrinkable. This was not the case at all this time. It tasted like pink lemonade should. Sweet, a little sour, and overall delicious. My only complaint was I only got a couple sips of the taste. They should water it down and make a larger drink out of this because it would be awesome and I would drink it much more than I should.

I haven't even opened this drink yet and I'm already both terrified and excited. Look at the list of random ingredients on the front of the bottle:

• Ashwagandha


• Yerba Mate


• Tulsi


• Turmeric


• Ginger


• Cardamom


• Spearmint


• Coconut Nectar


• Coconut Oil


• Lemon


• Sea Salt


• Black Pepper


• Cinnamon

I opened this up and it literally looked like curry. So much turmeric floating at the top Then I gave it a smell and it smelled like curry with a good amount of cinnamon and ginger. After reading that long list of ingredients I thought for sure one of them was going to stand out, but it's literally a wave of different tastes. One sip the ginger and cinnamon stood out, but the next the black pepper burned my lips. As far as weird drinks go, this is at the top of the list.

The problem is, I don't know whether I love it or hate it. It's definitely a sipping drink. Unless you are a masochist, I wouldn't advise you drink this in one shot. I'm sure this drink is really good for you, but I don't think I could stomach drinking the whole thing.

A couple weeks ago I went to PAX East aka Penny Arcade Expo in Boston, MA. It's basically a giant gaming convention stemming from a long running webcomic about video games. It was my first time attending and I had a lot of fun.

In addition to all the new and upcoming games, there was a 5-Hour Energy booth set up in the front lobby all weekend. Normally I would avoid these little bottles of death like the plague, but the line for the coffee shop in the hotel was always way too long and I didn't want to get my ass handed to me when I was playing Halo 4 against some 6 year old. Over the weekend, I lost count at 4 or 5 of these consumed. I'm afraid to know the actual number, but I did manage to bring an additional 5 home with me somehow.

Does this taste like "berry"? Sure. Could it be mistaken for another flavor? Most likely. Did I barely notice the flavor due to consuming this in one sip due to over-exhaustion and wanting to just "wake up"? You betcha! Did it work? Indeed it did.

I rarely have trouble sleeping but last night and the last couple nights, my mind has been racing and it's all about one thing and that thing is SimCity. I have been building a region with two dudes from work and have stayed up later than I have in a long time. One o'clock, two o'clock. Who cares? I need more simoleans. I need more power. I need to build another block of residential. I've got a sewage problem. There is always something that needs to get done. After a week of intense game play, it has eaten so much of my nights up that I am ill. I just need too much sleep now to compensate.

In hopes that this knocks me into a nine hour coma, I am trying this drink. It's small, two swigs, and it's gone. It's a little diet but less than most diet drinks. It's fruity but doesn't taste like a "real" fruit. I assume without doing any research that "dreamfruit" is not a real fruit. I don't know if all the fruits, but I am going to jump the gun and say that it isn't real. It might be psychosomatic, but I am getting sleepy. That's good. It's been about ten minutes. I have to manage the strength to brush my teeth and wash my face and then just fall into bed. I just need to stop doing this review.

I had a fairly stressful day that I don't want to get into, so I won't because it's my life, and my website and I make the rules. I was worried. I was upset. I wanted to sleep the day away, but I had too much to do. Lucky for me this little guy had shown up in the mail. I downed the shot like an alcoholic at noon, and went about my scheduled activities.
Since it is a shot I didn't expect it to taste the greatest, but I would never have expected what I got. I expected the harshness that only a concentrate with a bunch of chemicals in it can give you. What I got was a fluid that tasted like someone liquefied some baby aspirin and added a berry flavored , sugar replaced with stevia Pixie Stix. At first it really threw me off and I thought it was gross, but then I realized that it actually tasted fairly pleasant and way better than the harshness I had expected.
I definitely calmed down shortly after drinking this. I will attribute part of it to the ingredients of this bottle and part to Mike's ridiculous stories that he told in a podcast we recorded for Buffalo Eats. Which one played the stronger role? I guess we'll never know, but I am glad that I have a few more bottles of this on hand for future stressful days.

Things got real weird in my brain last night. I'm not one to subscribe to the preaching of the apocalypse, but for some reason as I lay in bed, trying to fall asleep I started to wonder if all this jazz about the Mayan calendar was correct, and that the world was going to end in a couple of weeks. It started off with me thinking that everything was going to end in one big shebang, like the sun was going to collide with the Earth and everyone and everything would die instantaneously. At this point I just tried to get everything in order in my mind of where I wanted to be, and with who (aka the woods with my close family and friends). I thought I was okay with that, but then my pre-sleep mind started to think about what would happen if there was disaster everyone, but I still lived. I instantly wrote off zombies, and thought more of a The Road type scenario. I was trying to figure out everything I would have to get together and where I'd go when I decided that I was an idiot and I really needed to get to sleep, so I reached into my nightstand and pulled out this bad boy. It certainly helped calm my brain down, and made it do normal brain things like sleep when it's 3am and you have to be up in six hours. Thank goodness for melatonin, valerian root and rose hips.

Oh you want to know what it tastes like? Well it starts with a berry flavor, that is heavy on the blueberry side of things, and then it takes a quick turn that reminds me of iced teas that I have gotten at Asian markets that have licorice root in them. It doesn't taste like black jellybeans, but it tastes like a natural tea, or chewing on a switch from a licorice tree. So we have a decent flavor and no worries about the end of the world…€¦I feel fine.

I think the median price for energy shots right now is around $3. I rarely/never buy energy shots, but I'm always noticing them at checkout counters and if they were cheaper I would probably buy them more often to review. I'm guessing $3 is what they usually are because that's the price that makes me hesitate with drinks. If it's a root beer, cream soda, or cola that we haven't reviewed this hesitation goes away.

There wasn't any hesitation with this energy shot because it was 99 cents at Aldi. For those who don't have Aldi grocery stores in their town, it's the cheapest store around. If Dollar Tree expanded their food selection by 6 rows and added a cooler and freezer, it would basically be another Aldi store. Don't get me wrong, there's sometimes some great food for cheap there, but more often than not it's bottom of the barrel as far as quality.

With that said, I wasn't expecting much from this energy shot. It tastes exactly like cherry Nyquil. I recently was sick and had to take some so it's taste is fresh in my mind. It's not as thick (thankfully), and hopefully won't put me to sleep because I have a lot of work to do. I thought it was going to taste a lot worst, so I'm pleasantly surprised.

I've been having some awful tooth pain lately. I finally made an appointment to see the dentist, but last night was not fun. My mind was racing about how I can't afford to go to the dentist and fearing that the doctor is going to tell me I have to stop drinking soda. With my mind racing and my tooth pain, I was having a hard time falling asleep so I decided to give this relaxation shot a try.

I have been drinking a lot of lemonade lately so when I saw lemon flavor on the bottle, I assumed it was going to be tart. To my dismay, it was not. It wasn't bad, just surprising. My housemate claimed it smelled and tasted like Pine-sol but he couldn't be farther from the truth. It's a smooth lemon taste. It's actually a mellow taste, which is nice.

As we know with "functional" drinks such as this, the taste is only half of it. I was interested to see how well this worked because unlike a lot of relaxation drinks, this doesn't have melatonin in it. They went for the all-natural approach to relaxation, and it worked. Within an hour I was asleep and slept like a baby. On a night where I almost gave up on sleep, this was a miracle drink.

I'll tell you what blows and that's waking up sick as a dog. I'm floating through the day and it's a feeling that I absolutely hate. Plus, I've got a dry cough that I can't shake no matter how much liquid I drink and cough drops I have. I've got to put it in the hands of the drink gods to provide me with something that will battle the vermin inside of me. I had this little guy lying around, read the nutritional facts and knew that this is what I needed.

I slightly knew what I was getting into with this drink. The others have been little powerhouses and I was lucky to discover that this one was a whole lot less powerful. I was grateful for that. This one still had a little "functional" taste to it but it did taste a bit like fruit punch. That "functional" taste I speak of is that thing where you know that a drink is up to something like when you taste it, it tastes funny and you read the ingredients and discover that it's a whole serving of vegetables in it. That type of feeling except this one is just chocked full of vitamin and minerals so that small fries can play baseball. I hope that my son is a better baseball player than I was. I don't think my dad could take another lame outfielder in the family.

Overnight flights are simultaneously the best and the worst. They are the bet because you can sleep through most of the flight and it seems to pass quickly, which is always appreciated. Even if I have an early morning flight I tend to stay up the whole night before, just so that I can sleep on the plane.

They are the worst because no matter how tired you are; you never get a consistent sleep. It's impossible to get “sleep comfortable” on a plane. There's no place to put your head and if you try to sleep in a full sitting position your head will inevitably fall forward like you were in some boring class in high school that just put you out. Case in point is my last day in Vegas and the flight home. I woke up at 7:30 am and went and ate far too much at breakfast. Then I walked around all day to wear myself out. There was a point where I just thought that if I just sat down anywhere I would pass out, but I stayed vertical and kept moving. Our plane left around midnight. I tried to stay awake until they approved use of portable electronic devices so that I would put on some sleepy music to drown out all the noise around me. I remember the plane starting to move on the runway, but I apparently couldn't keep my eyes open for another minute because I was out before the plane left the ground. You would think that a situation like that would be ideal, but as it turns out that sleep lasted me a whole twenty minutes of a five-hour flight. As to be expected, my head fell forward and I woke up, unable to fall back asleep. Luckily I had planned ahead and brought a Koma Unwind with me. I quickly downed the berry chemical flavored liquid, which I initially thought was horrible, but left a pleasant aftertaste. It's rare that these shots truly taste pleasant, so I'll take all of the niceness I can get out of them. After about 10 minutes of pondering the taste I was asleep again. I wasn't able to sleep through the flight, I woke up probably every 20 minutes or so, but the unwind shot helped me to fall back to sleep with relative ease. The moments that I was awake were extremely annoying, but I will take that collective 2 minutes over being conscious for a five-hour flight any day.

So I'm in Vegas for my sister's wedding. We spent three flights that were all delayed and took way, way too long. We thought we had missed our last connecting flight, because the one before it was late landing. We had to book it through the airport and made it to the terminal just in time. Once we finally made it to Vegas it took forever to get off our flight. When we made it to the car rental they said they were out of the cars we wanted, so they upgraded us to a Mustang convertible. For most people that would be awesome, but we are driving 5 hours to the Grand Canyon, and there is very little room in the car. Annoyances abound.

Finally we made it to our hotel, and they told us the only nonsmoking room they have left is right over where the bands play. I said whatever I just needed sleep. We dragged our bags to the room to find out that not only did they forget to turn on the air conditioning, so the room was a million degrees, but the band they spoke of was actually a DJ party that goes on until 4am with constant terrible beats. It was so damn loud.

I was so unbelievably tired, but due to the heat and the noise, I just couldn't fall asleep. I will be eternally grateful that I had packed this sleep shot, and not drank it for the plane (and read comics instead). I downed it, and I don't remember much after that until I awoke at 9am to a freezing room. The air conditioning decided to work properly. That is what I talk about a functional product. It has a diet pineapple sports drink flavor to it. It doesn't taste like poison, so I was thankful for that. It was light, with a decent flavor and after downing a shot I was out. Thank you Dream Water.

ps. We switched rooms in the morning after someone else checked out. Things may turn out okay after all.

Do you want a night of completely mundane dreams? Well then I have the water for you. I drank this last night and I dreamt that I was at the grocery store checking all the drinks against the list on my phone to see if we had reviewed it. You know, like how I spend most of my days. Then when I cashed out there was a problem with my card and a manager got called over. He then yelled at the cashier, whom I stuck up for and a shouting match ensued. Completely boring.

The thing is that you don't drink these to have insane crazy dreams. You drink them to sleep, and it performed that function perfectly. I tossed and turned for an hour last night. It was obviously that I wasn't getting any closer to Slumberland on my own. I needed help from a bottle. Within 15 minutes of slamming this down my gullet I was out cold.

The drink was also surprisingly not gross. As we've stated dozens of times drinks that come in shot forms are gross by nature. This on the other hand tastes like a flavor of Vitamin Water Zero. It's pomegranate and blueberry flavored, and it doesn't taste chemical at all. It tastes like flavored water, and it doesn't even taste concentrated. I like it as a drink, and I love it as a sleep aid. This is a win-win for everyone except my dreams.

If this drink were a person, it would be Arnold Schwarzenegger circa 1970 while he was giving it his all to become Mr. Olympia. Every sip is beating the living crap out of me. You all know that I've been around like a lot lizard at a trucker's parking lot convention when it comes to drinks. This one is downright violent. Every baby sip tastes like I'm drinking a thick, syrupy monster that is just so concentrated that mentally, my brain is telling my I made a mistake by not mixing it with water. Like if you put a packet of Kool-Aid into a shot of water. That's how I feel.

This is a strong drink. You know how big Arnold is. You know how big Lou Ferrigno is. These are the people that I'm comparing to this drink. It's an energy drink. It tastes like an energy drink. It's like a double shot of liquefied candy. It's G.D. brutal. Mind meltingly intense. I can say, without a doubt, this will give you energy. I can say, without a doubt, this will give you "bad" energy. I say, without a doubt, that you will make the same "Ooohhh" face with every sip that I did.

Sometimes I wonder why we even review “shot” drinks. They all taste fairly bad by nature. There's always an underlying chemical-esque flavor to them. Sure they all have their specific purposes, but we do this site to talk about the way things taste, not really to discuss their functional merits.

This shot here tastes like chemical orange concentrate. Okay it's less chemically than other shots I've had, but the weird flavor is still there. That flavor is the obscene amounts of vitamins and minerals that are jammed into this 2.5oz of fluid. As far as shots go, it's not terrible, and the aftertaste doesn't last very long. I can't ever imagine sitting down and drinking a big glass of something that tasted like this though, it would be disgusting. So for a shot it's decent. In terms of a beverage it's gross. It's all about sacrificing flavor for functionality and convenience these days.

Robert Van Winkle felt like a failure, and a disappointment to his family. When your great-great-grandfather is Rip Van Winkle you are expected to be able to sleep through anything. Unfortunately that was not true for Robert. Ever since he was a baby he was a bit on an insomniac. He would get in fights with his parents and they would tell him he was an embarrassment and they often accused him of abusing energy drinks. The truth is that he had never so much as tasted a drop of an energy drink. His lack of sleep was a natural thing. His theory was that his ancestors used up all of the sleep allocated to his bloodline, thus cursing him with constant wakefulness. The upside of this was that Robert became a genius. Since he rarely slept, he used all of his waking hours on his studies and quickly had several doctorates and became a scientist. He dreamed of someday creating a potion that would give him the relief of sleep that his family clung to so much.

This bottle that I hold in my hand is the result of years of endless research and trials. Robert Van Winkle finally overcame his demons and I'm happy to say that with the first shot that he drank he quickly fell into a long relaxed slumber. His success mixture tasted like gummy orange slices that had been liquefied. He was shocked at how his final version actually did not taste very intense. It didn't taste like chemicals like so many of his past attempts. He beat science and a family curse. Robert Van Winkle is a true American hero.