Rob's Really Good Zero Coconut Pineapple

For those of you who grew up Southern Ontario, or Western New York any time from 1888 until 1989 probably remembers Crystal Beach (I can't believe it was around for a hundred years). It was a great amusement park, which was basically Coney Island on Lake Erie. Growing up in the 80's, the 1980's, we hand a handful of amusement parks within an hour drive of us. My favorite was always Crystal Beach. It had great rides, but on top of that it also had a beach, which gave the park a completely different feel than Darien Lake, Fantasy Island and the other smaller parks. It always felt like I was traveling back in time, or stepping into a completely different world when I was there. We would always go early, hit up some rides, and then head to the beach for a few hours before finishing up the night with some more rides. The world famous roller coaster The Comet was always ridden as much as possible. Every trip to the park would be concluded by getting one of the fancy suckers they sold there and going on the “umbrella ride” that carried us in a cart over the park and over part of the beach. Once I was on that ride I knew my day of fun was over, but it was always a fitting end to a great day.

Now I've hated coconut since I was a kid. I just recently started to like coconut water, but I did and still do despise the candied and toasted coconut flavors. For some reason I really liked the pina colada suckers they had at the park. I don't know if I just got them because I thought I was being a rebellious kid getting a sucker named after an alcoholic drink or what. All I know is for some unknown reason these suckers got a pass from my hatred. When I took a sip of this beverage my first thought was “oh gross candied coconut.” Then a second later I realized it tasted exactly like those suckers, and I was okay with it. It has a watered down pineapple flavor that gets overpowered by coconut at the end. It tastes nothing like coconut water though. In reality it has the coconut flavor that I can't stand in most cases, but it brought me back to some great family outings from my childhood, and I can't hold a flavor I don't like against it.