Lemonade - 275 Reviews

I didn't realize yesterday was the first day of summer until someone on Facebook posted about it. Shows you how much I pay attention to stuff like that. I think the only people who know about that kind of stuff are those who work in offices with someone who just loves to bring little factoids like that up because they have nothing else going on in their life and don't know how to have a real conversation that isn't about yesterday's episode of the Maury Povich show (which they record on their programmed VCR because they can't be bothered to upgrade to a DVR like the rest of the world).

So yeah, I didn't know yesterday was the first day of summer. Does it really matter? Not really. It wouldn't have changed my day at all. I would have still gotten crappy news, and I still would have seen one of my favorite bands play at a new venue in town. Most importantly, I would have still drunk this lemonade because it's 1:30am and it's stupidly hot. I've been lying in bed thinking about what to do with my summer while watching The League and unsuccessfully sleeping. I felt parched and remembered I had this jug in the fridge.

Most people probably think of apples/apple cider when they hear the name Mayer Bros, but let me tell you they make a hell of a lemonade. Granted this is the first lemonade I've had this summer so far, but it's going to be hard to beat. It's tart and crisp and the perfect sweetness. Most importantly, it has that indefinable "pink" flavor that is just so good. Do yourself a favor and pick up a jug of this lemonade during the summer heat. You'll thank me later.

How to the people at Brisk sleep at night, knowing the damage they have wrought to the world of iced tea? Brisk is to iced tea what sour apple flavoring is to apples. They are about as far removed as you can be from the original and still share a base name. It just gives iced tea a bad name for those out there who haven't (for some reason or another) tasted real, decent tea.

While I disagree with this line, I have to admit that this flavor is a little bit of alright. It is not amazing, it's not even really all that good, but I did have a one liter bottle of it, and over two sittings I drank the entire thing. None of it got dumped down the drain, like I had expected. White it definitely has their classic “iced tea” in there, the lemonade makes up for it. It gives it a nice balance, and on a nice hot day like today I will begrudgingly say it hits the spot.

I am concerned that the ingredient list reads: water, high fructose corn syrup…€¦. Seriously, the sweetener so high on the list? That's just kind of disgusting. Shockingly there are only 44g of sugar in this entire bottle. I expected it to be in the 60s, but that is still a lot.

I am a simple man, and I enjoy the simple things in life. Logic dictates that since they contain very few ingredients and no attitudes that I should enjoy Blue Print's juice beverages, and I'm not one to argue with logic. This drink is wonderful is it's simplicity. Let me break this down for you. It's essentially lemonade that is made from filtered water with organic lemons squeezed into it. Since that would be a bit on the tart side, a healthy dose of agave nectar is added to the mix. I have no doubt that this would be a fine lemonade indeed, but Blue Print wanted to take things a bit further, so they also added in some limejuice. I've obviously had lemonade before, and I've even tried a few limeades, but I have never had them combined, and I must tell you they work much better in this fashion than when combined in a soda. The folks at Blue Print still weren't completely sold on their beverage. Sure it was delicious, and the marriage of the fruits made it stand out a bit, but what this drink needed was a bit of a kick. The only logical solution to this dilemma was to add our old friend ginger to the mix. That my friends is how Blue Print hit a home run with this beverage. The ginger is right up there with the lemon. It's got a little bit of a burn, but I don't believe it's enough to turn anyone off from the drink, it's just enough to make you go “OHHH!” and dive right back in for another sip.

My only complaint about this drink is the hefty price tag. It's $8 for a 16oz beverage with low cost ingredients. I know that their other beverages have a bunch of different fruits and vegetables in them, and that they are raw, and as fresh as prepackaged juice can be, but I could go to a juice bar and not spend that much on a drink that I watch them juice before my eyes. As much as I enjoy this I just can't justify paying that much, so there is very little chance that I will return to this flavored well.

Coffee coffee coffee. Enough, alright? We get it. The Keurig is the invention of the decade. I'm not even arguing it. Swarms of people who previously couldn't make a decent cup of coffee to save their lives are now regular baristas. You know, just writing this makes me feel bad for actual baristas. I bet Starbuck's, Tim Horton's, and Dunkin' Donuts sales went down since the invention of that thing. I imagine that if you even breathe the word "Keurig" to someone who works at a coffee place they just shudder and their hand involuntarily turns into a fist.

I'm not taking bread out of anyone's mouth with this guy, though. Half iced tea and half lemonade lightly sweetened. It's lightly sweetened. Did you hear me? Real sugar sugared just enough to still be able to taste the tea and the lemony lemons. It was pretty good. I've had two or three of them and intend on drinking that whole, what do K-Cups come in, 24? 16? Whatever. I'll drink all of them.

Starbuck's et al; you will be fine. Something will come out that says that there is a high content of fecal matter in the cups and everyone will come crawling back for forgiveness. That's when you use your foam skills to spell something lewd to which they deserve.

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.

Glaceau and the team over at Vitamin Water have "borrowed" kids from all countries of the earth, flown them out to their headquarters in the coldest parts of mother Russia, fed them a diet of crackers and water and the occasional Flintstone vitamin and had them create the most "kid like" lemonade taste buds have ever tasted.

The kids worked day and night for almost a month and actually did it. Glaceau's resident scientists have drunk too many drinks in their lives so they taste buds have been skewed. A child's palate is more novice and can really have an open mind when it comes to drinks. Together, these kids made good lemonade that's a "lowest common denominator" type drink. No offensive pulp. Lightly tart. Moderately sweetened. Overall good lemonade.

Once the kid's sole task was complete, Glaceau gave them an envelope with $1000, a note to give to their parent's that said, "We're sorry but we needed help. You will receive a case of Squeezed as soon as production is complete. Sincerely, Glaceau." and a box set of Jake and the Neverland Pirates to watch when they get home. I'd say that's fair.

It has recently come to my attention that through all the gallons of beverage that I have drank throughout my 34 years I have never once had a NOS energy drink. I've drunk far more energy drinks than I am comfortable admitting, but for some reason I have never reached for one of these. Perhaps it's because far too much of my time during my 20's was spent with friends who cared far too much (in my opinion at the time) about cars. We're talking about “pimping” and sooping up cars for cars shows and the like. Because of the boredom I underwent I became disinterested in all things car related. Now that I am older I say, whatever makes you happy, do it, but back them I was a surly bastard about it.

Anyways here I stand at my inaugural tasting, and of course it's not even for their flagship product, but a new line that they are promoting called Active. This line is basically an energy drink/sports drink hybrid. Due to the bottle and the fact that both are distributed by Coca Cola, I have it in my mind that this is NOS mixed with Powerade. I have no idea if that is true, but that is the way it looks and that is the way it tastes.

What we have here is very light lemonade with a little bit of raspberry flavor to it with a whole lot of electrolytes thrown in the mix. Oh, and a whole lot of sodium, which is normal for sports drinks. You don't taste the energy drink aspect of this at all. The only foreign flavor I can really taste is the artificial sweetener sucralose. Overall this isn't all that bad. It's not a flavor that I generally go for, but I know there is definitely a lot of people out there that would.

This is a beverage made for when you work out. My question is when are you supposed to drink it though? If you drink it before you work out you get the benefit of the caffeine, taurine and the like, but the electrolytes are wasted. If you drink it after, the opposite is true. I suppose you could drink it during your work out, but I feel like you'd only get half the benefits from each side. I chose to drink it before hand, in hopes that somehow the electrolytes are set on a time release. We can only hope.

Am I the only one who feels like non-carbonated energy drinks don't work? Even thought I know they have the exact same energy giving ingredients, the absence of thousands of tiny bubbles tricks my brain into thinking that I will not be awake for much longer. Well brain, learn to work properly because I can assure you this does provide the burst of energy that it sells you on. It's been awhile since I have physically been able to feel an energy drink, and I'm sure my nearly empty stomach played a supporting role in that.

Monster hit the nail on the head when they decided to mix their energy formula with tea and lemonade. They use a nice mixture of brewed black and green tea, instead of some garbage powder. That mixed with the pink lemonade it tastes wonderfully like summer and it does a great job of masking the typical energy drink flavor. It also 95% hides the taste of the sucralose used to sweeten this. This is decent tasting lemonade that has only 6g of sugar in the entire can. That's some kind of magic right there. By the way what is in pink lemonade that makes it pink? Online tells me it's just dye, but it taste different to me.

On top of this tasting great and giving you a healthy dose of hopped up energy it also has coconut water and a bunch of antioxidant rich fruits to help you recover from a rough night of some crazy scavenger hunt that you were more than likely on. I mean that's how everyone spends their weeknights, right? Oh, and the secret to winning is to find the name of the baby gorilla buried in the pet cemetery, and get that can of Mello Yellow, no matter what.

I love coffee, there's no hiding it. I don't know why it's taken me this long to have a drink made from the fruit of a coffee bean. Verdict? I love it! This lemonade is really delicious, especially for a diet lemonade. I opted to drink this instead of coffee this morning after only a couple hours of sleep and it definitely did the trick. Granted it doesn't have as much caffeine as a cup of coffee, but it has enough to wake me up this morning so I didn't pass out on the bus to work.

As Mike loves to point out, I am not the largest supporter of lemons. When I get water in a restaurant, I never ask for them. If they get put in anyways I always take them out without giving them a squeeze. This makes my ladyfriend happy, as she loves them and doubles up in her drink. I also prefer my iced teas sans lemon, which according to “big tea” is unheard of. They are always putting lemon juice in their teas, and I think a lot of the time it is distracting, and I would just rather taste the tea.

Even though I have a general disinterest in lemons, I will always have a soft spot for decent lemonade. I think my problem is that in most drinks there is either just a little bit of lemon that makes it annoying (I would rather have the flavor be strong) or they use some weird lemon that makes the beverage taste like cleaner. Lemonade suffers from neither of those things. When done properly it is tart/sour with a nice pleasant sweetness to it. It sounds like those are conflicting things, but I'm sure you all know what I mean.

Calypso makes lemonade the way I like it. They concentrate on a great tasting base that could stand on it's own as a quality lemonade. That is a very important concept that many companies overlook. They cheap out on their lemonade or tea, and just expect the extraneous flavor to work overtime. Calypso starts with a great lemonade and adds great flavoring on top of that. In this specific flavor they add mango puree concentrate, so it actually tastes like mangos and not fake.

As your drink doctor I must insist that if they temperate is ever over 90 degrees that you drinks lemonade, and specifically Calypso when it is available.

Zero calories, zero sugar and very little diet flavor. How do they do it? Science, that's how. Or should I say Xyience? Non-carbonated energy drinks always throw me for a loop, but this one really works. It tastes like light lemonade, with just a touch of raspberry in it. If this were served to me on a hot summer day from a pitcher into a glass full of ice, I might think there was something a little weird about it, but I would never expect it to be an energy drink, and that is something that companies strive for, but rarely achieve. Leave it Xyience to come through.

Oh and by the way, it's April in Buffalo and I already have my second sunburn of the year. There is going to be an epic battle this summer.

You know what I like? Diet energy drinks that don't taste gross. See, we here at Thirsty Dudes consume a lot of empty calories everyday. Because of this, I have come to enjoy diet drinks because it means I don't consume more calories. The problem with this of course is the majority of diet drinks taste like someone mixed dirt and battery acid and made stew out of it. This is especially true for a lot of diet energy drinks.

I have been really tired this week, due to lack of sleep. It's starting to (finally) warm up here in Buffalo so drinking hot coffee in the morning isn't something I like to do. Because of this, I have been drinking more energy drinks than I'd like to. They do the job, but I'm trying to drink as little of them as possible.

All that being said, this drink is delicious! The lemonade is sweet and slightly tart, and the pineapple taste compliments it very well. It makes sense that UFC made this its official energy drink because it's a touchdown. Wait, UFC isn't football? Oh, fighting, hmmmm... It's a punch to the mouth? That doesn't sound too positive.

Things are starting to warm up. The internet weathermen tell us that it's supposed to get up to 70 today. While I'm sure that won't stay consistent, theirs is no doubting that in the relatively near future lemonade season will once again be upon us. The weather may get hot, but the drink will help keep us cool. Now regular lemonade is great. It's simple and it gets the job done. Fruit flavored lemonades are even better. I was recently exposed to the Passion Lemonade at Starbucks and let me tell you it was a treat. Big Island Organics decided to go all the way to the top of the mountain and make a lemonade so great that they had to change its name as to not hurt the feelings of the lesser drinks.

They call it gingerade, but it is clearly flavored lemonade. The ingredients are water, lemon juice and agave nectar. That there are the makings of one hell of a lemonade, but why stop there when you can ad glorious Hawaiian yellow ginger. With it in the mix you get a great taste as well as a nice burn that is sure to turn a lot of people off, but those people aren't us are they? We love the burn, the more the better. Well, maybe not in this case, since this is a sippin' drink for a nice hot day in the sun. In that case, this has the absolutely perfect amount of burn to it.

I'm not wonderful with energy drinks, usually because I run myself on "E" a lot of the time. It's how I keep my slender figure. One thing you don't do is drink one on an empty stomach, which I idiotically did, and go and get the shakes like an idiot. I feel like my fingers typing this review are going faster than my brain wants to send down the commands for the words. It's probably bottlenecking in my stomach where the fantastic taco I just ate is residing temporarily.

Shakes aside, and let's be honest, that was my fault. This isn't a bad drink at all. It's fruity and is defiantly more "berry" than "lemonade" but I'm not really complaining. If you are on the "hater" side of the fence when it comes to Stevia and friends, you might and probably won't like this drink. It's not as bad as it could be but there is a prompt and abrupt interruption when you are enjoying the berry lemonade of it. The sparkling bit of it is a nice touch.

Spring is here. Well, I hope it is. In Buffalo you never know. It could snow tomorrow and no one would be surprised. But for now, I am really enjoying this frozen lemonade. It's not as sour as I had hoped, but I'm sure they have to appease with those who like mild lemonade.

There's not much else to say about this. It's refreshing and light, and good for a warm day like today.

Lemonade is tough, man. Well, actually. Lemonade is simple. I guess mass amounts of lemonade is tough because not many people get it "right." Some get it close. Some do a fair job. Some bastardize the second easiest drink created next to sweet tea, which is equally hard to mess up and equally hard to find a decent one. I'm not saying this isn't decent but I'm not saying it's anything more. It's certainly tart so they got that right but there is a certain flavor in the back of my throat that is just not common with lemonade. It could be the corn syrup that's allowing it to linger and get worse as it stays there but I'm not really counting that against them too much. Look, it's fine. If you want lemonade in the wintertime, you've done it. If you want lemonade for around a dollar, you've got it. If you want something that you can share with friends while you're skating around an empty parking lot working on your ollies and kickflips, you've got it. If you want something that you want to double down your investment and get it back tenfold, you're far off. This is fine. This is safe. This will sell. This has to exist. See where I'm going with this? It's average and will sell millions of bottles because it's just like what else is out there. It's not breaking any barriers and making anyone think but it's not supposed to. It's right where it wants to be and it's doing a great job being there. That's not where I go, though.

Kids nowadays. You are spoiled brats. When I was a kid, we had orange juice, apple juice, and Hugs. Juice was terrible in comparison to now. You brats. This juice is so good. It's light, tangy, fruity, organic, and doesn't have any artificial flavors or any sugar. As lemonade it's great and as juice it's great. It wins all over the board. Kids, you are jerks because of the garbage that I had to drink. I know it's not your fault. You should know it's not your fault but I'm still holding you a little responsible. It's not really a jealousy thing either since even though I'm an adult, I can still drink whatever you drink. I don't care if it's for kids. You can't have it all to yourselves and also, I'm an adult and you have to respect me. As your (immature) elder, you have to allow me to drink your juice. You know what? You're grounded. I'm taking all your juice, especially if it's this good.

I'm surprised that it took me as long as it did to have a half and half. I mean, it's lemonade and tea. Two liquids that are pretty good together. I think it takes a whole new level. Even cruddy iced tea and cruddy lemonade makes a pretty good half and half. Somehow, two average things put together can make something great. I'm not saying this drinks two protagonists are cruddy but we can all admit that they're not the finest. Together, though, you get a good amount of lemonade and iced tea that battle it out for your love. It's not often that you people fight over your mouth. It's not like you are a pretty girl and everyone wants to kiss you. You have a beard and haven't showered in a week. Easily a week. You have been wearing the same t-shirts for a decade and have awful taste in music. In real life no one is fighting for your mouth. This is your chance to see what it's like.

I went to Hawaii for a friends wedding a few years ago. Before we left for the islands I had very little interest in our destination. Sure I knew I was going to have fun, but I'm not really a beach guy as the sun causes my skin to combust after a very short period of time. It's now two years later and I still talk about the trip all of the time. I'm a person who travels a decent amount, and I've seen a lot of places, but going to Kauai was one of the best experiences of my life. A couple of us have been talking about arranging another trip back, and as a result I have been selling a whole mess of junk I have around the house to raise money. I will surf. I will jump off waterfalls, and most importantly I will do it in exchange for records and such that I never listen to.

Drinking this lemonade, has given me another push to put a bunch of stuff up on eBay again this week so I can reach my goal of flight/hotel basically in trade. I drank a whole mess of lemonade over the week and half I spent on Kauai, and since my mind has been on it for the past few weeks, one sip of this brought be right back there. This is nicely tart, but with some agave sweetness to even it out. It's water, lemon juice and a sweetener. It's how lemonade should be. I'll never know why companies add a ton of extraneous ingredients to their lemonade. This is all there needs to be and it's wonderful.

Now I will go through my record collection again and thin it out for the cause.

Thirsty Dudes' friend Diana and her sister have a serious problem. It's to such an extent that I am looking into getting them on Intervention. No, they are not alcoholics, nor are they popping pills. They aren't even hysterically inhaling computer cleaner. Their addiction is something so much more sinister. The Vito sisters are addicted to the Dutch food, toast sprinkles.

“Like junkies waiting for their sweet, sweet fix” these two sisters will drive up to St Catharines, ON in order to fill up their tiny hatchback with box upon box of little chocolate sprinkles to put on their buttered toast. It is truly a sickness that needs professional attention, and perhaps a television spot.

I suppose we did benefit from their addiction as on a recent trip Diana brought me back this bottle of juice/lemonade concentrate. Let me rephrase that, “this enormous bottle of juice/lemonade concentrate.” Seriously it would take me years to get through this bottle as you add a tablespoon of concentrate to a glass of water. It is a mixture of apple, strawberry, elderberry and rosehip concentrate. It tastes like what I always hope fruit punch tastes like before I take a sip. This is 75% fruit, which is more than can be said about most fruit punch. It mostly just tastes like a mixture of strawberries and elderflower, which is a recipe for greatness. I mixed it with normal water, but I think if it were added to sparkling water, I would be in for a real treat.

Now back to pestering the folks at intervention, so I can make one of my friends day and embarrass the other a great amount.