Grace - 9 Reviews

I could go for some nice tropical rhythms. It's getting cold here in Buffalo and I started to get ready for the inevitable winter. I put away all of the lawn furniture and I started putting plastic up on the windows I live in an old apartment and the windows don't do much for keeping out the cold drafts). I could use a nice little island retreat before I get into the icy slump of winter.

Unfortunately this drink didn't give me the feeling of hanging out in the sun with the waves crashing and some weird birds cawing. The title would leave one to believe that this is a nice mango juice from concentrate. One sip and I knew that there was some carrot in the mix. It's not strong, but it's a flavor that I have grown to notice in drinks. I have no problem with carrots being added to beverages, as the health boost is appreciated. I just like knowing that it's in there beforehand. I do dislike the use of HFCS. All of the other Grace products I've tried have used real sugar, and that is always preferred. The sweetener in this gives it a weird syrupy taste that I could do without. I understand high fructose corn syrup in soda to an extent, but adding it to juice just seems completely unnecessary.

Had this been sweetened with sugar, or had no added sweeteners, and been labeled mango carrot I can guarantee I would have had a more pleasant ride with it. Now someone bring me more blankets. I refuse to turn my heat on before Thanksgiving.

I don't think that I've eaten a grapefruit in well over two decades. I just remember them being super tart and/or bitter. I've had things that are grapefruit flavored with no additional sugar that are quite awful. People eat it with tons of sugar on top. If you have to put sugar on your fruit, you're defeating the point of fruit. "Nature's candy", right? Isn't that what they say? "Nature's candy." You don't add sugar to candy. You're not supposed to. If you do, you don't really understand how candy works. If you add it to fruit, you don't understand how fruit works.

This drink knows how grapefruit pop should work. It's not terribly sweet and not wildly punchy like a lot of other ones. Squirt is good, right, but it's really sweet. This drink is more grapefruit and less pop. It could be the real sugar versus the corn syrup, which can kind of wipe out a lot of flavors. It's got a good smell and is not as strong as, say, Ting, but it's still good. If this is how they do grapefruit on the islands, as their moniker of "Island Soda," then I might have to frequent these islands. Maybe get a coconut so that I can drink this pop out of. It's how they do it. I hate feeling like I'm not a local.

Miller High Life is the self-appointed "champagne of beers." While I don't know much about beer, I doubt this is true and think that it's kind of a tongue-in-cheek thing, this could be the champagne of kola champagnes with one single caveat. Pre-caveat, right out of the fridge this is great. It's not as bubble-gummy as a lot of other kola champagnes I've had. It did have a nice, unexpected bit, like some of the ginger juice from their wonderful ginger beer got stuck in the machine, no one cared, and it bled into this drink leaving a little bit of a bite. I always want a little bit of a bite when it comes to food and drink. Spice almost always beats no spice.

Great, right? Awesome. But wait! I said there was one thing to worry about. That one thing is that you either have to keep this cold or drink it fast because once it lukewarms, it gets perfumey. I drank half, went and got a sandwich, came back, bad. Ten minutes or so killed this drink.

Don't let this happen to your kola champagne. Drink it fast or keep it on ice. Do the right thing.

You know what I hate? I hate when people get perfume in my pop. I absolutely hate it. I often leave open bottles of pop on the floor at grandmother's homes and you know how grandmas are. They spray that perfume on with a Super Soaker before raging at the Bingo parlor, just gallon after gallon of lavender and Chanel No. 5.

I must have accidentally left this bottle open at everyone's grandmother's house in Western New York before I drank it because this drink tastes like a slew of different old women. It was a lot like the Pakola Ice Cream pop that we drank many moons ago. It tastes nothing like you would expect and everything like you don't want. Not a strong sales approach.

Today we woke up to the sunny shore of Grand Cayman. An island whose economy is flourishing since the value of the US dollar is $0.80. Honestly, every drink I bought was not from a tourist trap and they were all over $3. I spent like $20 on about half a dozen pretty basic drinks.

Anyhow, Jessika and I went scuba...ing and it was awesome: tarpon as big as a six years old boy plus a legit shipwreck.

There was no rhyme or reason as to what I picked first but you should know that I was a bit partial to this drink as Grace stuff has been wonderful to us Thirsty Dudes.

I don't know what a june plum is, but I think I know what a golden apple, which is the parenthesized title of this drink. My guess is a yellow apple. If I'm wrong, I'm wrong. Either way the flavor was that of a weak apple. It doesn't stop there, though. There was ginger in it and that little bit of bite, that little bit of spice, made this drink. It wasn't as much as a ginger beer, but it was enough to make you do a double take because it "zinged" you. You got zinged, dogg.

I can't get this stuff back home, hence, why I got it on the Cayman Islands. Sure, everything is too expensive, even for a tourist trap, but it did give me this little gem.

Thus far I have been very impressed with all of the drinks I have tried from the Grace company. They make possibly the best ginger beer I've ever had, and the other drinks have been top notch as well. Seeing as I am a huge fan of pineapple I knew I was in for a treat with this treasure bottle.

Like every other pineapple soda I've ever had it doesn't really taste like pineapple. Actually let me change that up (No, I have never heard of a delete key. I type this all up on a typewriter I feel desperately insecure without a typewriter in the house. I unfortunately lent out my Martinelli to my friend Bill and it came back smashed), It tastes like someone took pineapple juice and removed everything acidic about it. All you're left with is a sugary sweet juice. While I would love to have a pineapple soda that showed the fruit the respect it deserves, this is still one of the greatest pineapple sodas I've tried. It's not quite pineapple, but not overly candy-esque.

Underneath the cap it also reads "Dubby know who fi frighten." Translations are welcomed.

Dear Mike,
Our search ends here. You wanted the ultimate ginger beer and I believe I have found it. Put away your Goya and your Blenheim red caps. Those are kids stuff compared to this.

The smell of this stuff was so strong that it almost made me sneeze. I took two sips and I needed to take a break because it burned so much. It's been over an hour and I'm still not done with the bottle. You take a sip, it doesn't seem to bad, then a decent burn kicks in, you think you're going to be fine, then a third intense ginger burns drop kicks your throat. That's right this is a "three alarm" ginger beer. The thing is that it's not just crazy hot, this bottle is also full of flavor. That first wave tastes like a great ginger ale. The second wave is a great ginger beer. The third wave? Well that is just pure burn. Well-played Grace. You know how to make a great soda. If I got this in a Jamaican restaurant I think it would be a toss up as to what was hotter the soda or my jerk.

What is wrong with us that we've been searching out the hottest ginger beer? I'm pretty sure third world countries use this stuff in their torture methodologies. Us we sit back and relax with a nice cool bottle of liquid fire. We sure are idiots.

Sherman, could you please get my Sorels? It's cold and I need to go outside to scour for food and supplies. They're in the back room. What are you doing? Why is it taking so long? What do you have there? Juice? Seriously? Well since I have it, I'll drink it. Whoa. Sherman. Where did you get this? You traveled all the way to town? I asked you to get my Sorel boots and you brought me...Sorrel drink. I guess I can see the problem here. Thanks, but why didn't you get some food when you were out? I mean you bought Ramen for yourself and this Sorrel drink, which I am quickly falling in love with. What are we going to eat later? We can only eat snow shaped like hot dogs for so long. I guess one more day won't hurt. Man, so good. Did you try this? Sherman, try it. It tastes like a spicy cranberry hibiscus juice. It's got that good ginger beer taste with a nice big fruit flavor. You like it, don't you buddy? Alright, I should have just gotten them myself. I'll get my boots and we'll go to town together and get stuff. I owe you one of these drinks because they are worth every penny. Maybe if you're good, I'll get you some chocolate. You love your chocolate.

This is a drink that would have a cameo role in my dreams. I can just imagine it now. I'm trekking across the prairies on a mission to get who knows where, but it's somewhere important. I suddenly come to a gate. Why is there a gate in the middle of the prairie with no fence? I surely don't know, but if you think I'm going to try and bypass it you my friend are the crazy one. I approach the gate and suddenly dozens of screaming undead souls come out of the ground in front of it. I am informed that if I do not dance with them they will tear into my flesh and eat every last morsel, even my pancreas. Who likes to eat pancreas? The undead I suppose. Before I know it someone has cranked "Jungle Boogie" and we're all getting down. There's even a dance line and everyone is trying to outdo each other. I make mention that I'm getting thirsty and one of the zombies pulls this bottle from his chest cavity. I blow off the dust, twist off the cap and take a big gulp. The pineapple is refreshing without being overly acidic. Then the ginger kicks in. At first it's just the flavor, but after I swallow the burn sets in. It's a good burn. The kind of burn that will give you the little push you need to out-dance the undead. Just as I'm about to pull out some big moves I wake up. My first thought would be "Where can I score me some of that juice in the waking world?"