No Sugar Added - 718 Reviews

If you took three different sized dudes, lined them up, insulted their mothers individually, and openly welcomed punches in the face, that's what this drink is like. Three different sized fists brutally assaulting your kisser. Three fists, at three separate times, pummeling your money maker.

This drink was awesome on the shelf and awesome in my mouth. Well that sounds gross. Eh, you know what? I'll leave it. You can taste everything but they don't share the spotlight, which I might enjoy more. You get a blast of cacao, then nutmeg, and then cardamom. Just like a two years old boy, there is no sharing going on and unlike that two years old boy, I like it.

This new line...Ayala. You're on to something, friends. I'm on to you and you're on to something great.

Lemon wedges in restaurants are dirty, dirty things. According to the news they rarely get washed and are full of bacteria that gets transferred to your drink. Ick. Lucky for me I'm not a huge lemon guy, and I like my water plain, so I stay bacteria free, well at least in that aspect.

For those of you that do like lemon in your water, try this much cleaner version. Adding a little package of True Lemon to water tastes exactly like you squeezed a nice big lemon wedge into your glass. It's powderized lemon juice, with no added sugar. I have friends who carry this stuff around like it was their bible. Come on, join the clean team.

You thought that Popeye was getting his strength from spinach but there was a dirty little secret behind that. Sure, he loved the green stuff but when you weren't looking and the camera changed angles, he would slam a can of his own proprietary blend of energy drink. He was very ahead of his time. Drinking this allowed him to bend large steel beams and lift cars with ease. It was just a plot from the vegetable industry to push more spinach to kids. He made out big time; enough to start his own energy drink line.

Now Popeye knew a thing or two about healthy stuff since he did manage to learn a thing or two about his vegetables. He didn't add sugar to his energy drink and let the natural flavors of the blackberry to flavor and sweeten this drink. He even snuck in some vegetables, possibly due to contracts, to color his drink. He did manage to make a drink that tastes more like something unique rather than your cookie cutter energy drink. The blackberry taste is pretty spot on and it's even got some bitterness from the blackberry left that didn't get cut out of the mix.

With Wimpy as his terrible accountant, they are slowly taking the energy drink world by storm with the phrase, "You'll gladly pay today for a Popeye's energy drink today."

To further my new quest to find a fantastic spicy chocolate drink to compare to an Aztec Hot Chocolate I had, I splurged and got this. Yeah, I'll admit it. I'm on a real loose, hot tea kick but I like my stuff strong. I'm new to the loose tea game so if you are, too, let me tell you something I learned. If you want a stronger tea, don't think that you can just let it steep for like fifteen minutes because then you'll have a tea that tastes like wood and old, wet leaves.

Cinnamon is a spice but I wouldn't say that it's particularly spicy. This is a chai and although I have had some with bite, this one smells better than it tastes. It's got hunks of solid chocolate, vanilla bean, and coconut pieces. You can actually taste all of it, which is pretty incredible. It tastes good and is decently strong. I steep on the longer side because I do like a stronger, thicker tea. It's not a chai like you might expect but it's still something different that you can enjoy any time of the day. It's faint enough on the chocolate side that you don't feel like a fat turd drinking it at ten in the morning. Yeah, I said it. Don't eat chocolate for breakfast. Sure, chocolate in cereal is fine but whomever is eating a bar of Hershey's in the morning should really re-evaluate your life and choice of chocolate. That's some novice stuff there, son. Wake up and get some quality dark in you. What are you, eight and in summer camp making smores?

I am an adulterer today, friends. After so many people have recommended that I drink Panera's green tea, I decided to try it. "But this is not a review for green tea, you idiot." I know and there is a simple explanation for that. I thought it was one of the teas in the back that you fill yourself. I was incorrect and found out as soon as I walked down past it. Drats. I figured since I hadn't reviewed this, and I had already decided I wasn't going to get my loved Hibiscus tea, that I might as well as "get this out of the way."

I judged too harshly. This isn't bad. I am not on the bandwagon of acai but this isn't too bad. Not too bad at all. It's got a good berry taste with only a slightly and not offensive bitterness from that turd acai. I don't know how Panera makes such good tea all the time but they brew a strong iced tea that pulls all the flavors out of the thing they're tea-ing. They must have some sort of vacuum that is sucking out the flavor and essence. It must have been custom built because they are beating everyone out. Custom flavor vacuum. That's a niche market that needs to be exploited.

Back when things on this planet were younger and simpler there was no such thing as money. Sure gold and jewels were precious and held value, but for normal transactions a barter system was used. If you're like me an image of Mad Max and Master Blaster just floated through the sea of your thoughts. While that may have been a utopian society in the making, it is nothing but fantasy. In the real world bartering did occur, and I'd like to think that the king of bartering was Joe, or the Trader fame.

Joe was the master trader. He was able to tell the way the winds of favor would blow, so he knew what to trade and when. It was like a predecessor of Wall Street. He would trade grapes for cherries in a town where cherries were prevalent. Then he would move on and trade those cherries in a pit free village for some animal furs. He was always trading up and eventually he trader for land and opened a store. Since he knew where he could get all of the highest quality products for the cheapest, his stores prices were low. It was the birth of an empire.

Nowadays things are run differently but Trader Joes remains. One actually just opened up in Buffalo. For those who don't know the company buys products from other companies in bulk and then slaps their own label on it. It's a lot cheaper than buying and running a factory to make each individual foodstuff. I'm not sure who originally made this spiced apple cider, but my hats off to them. It's just apples and spices to flavor. There is nothing artificial, and there is no added sugar. They have bottled the taste of autumn.

I'm from the area of the country where cider flows like water during these months. I am very picky about my cider and normally I do not like any that was not made at a local mill. This though, this is wonderful. The levels of the spices are at a perfect balance with the apple flavoring. It's a dangerous drink in that I could easily be a glutton and drink all 64oz in one sitting. I'm going to do my best not to do that, even though I just finished my second glass.

Once again, let me read the ingredient list to you: Apple pieces, cocoa kernels, chocolate chips (sugar, cocoa mass, cocoa powder), strawberry pieces, natural & artificial flavoring, chili, marigold petals. How many pounds can I sign you up for? Time for a little back story.

I went to a place called the "Chocolate Bar" where they have very good food, great desserts, and, from what I've been told, good chocolate martinis. There, they had a special Aztec hot chocolate that I felt the need to try and it was a wonderful decision. It was a wonderful mix of thick hot chocolate with actual chocolate in it with that nice, dusty, gritty Latin chocolate, spicy cinnamon and maybe nutmeg and chili heat in it. It was awesome. I loved it. I assumed, quite blindly, that this would be similar. I was wrong.

Yes, many of the ingredients are shared between the two and the extra ingredients; strawberry pieces; sound fantastic. Was it? Not particularly. It just didn't have any oomph. With all the ingredients and even in the name "Aztec Fire" you would assume there was some heat in this thing, right? Look, I don't want to sweat when I'm drinking a cup of tea, but I would like to get something that tastes more like a light scratch in my throat. I bought something spicy so make it spicy. If people don't want spicy things, they won't order them. That's something I never understood. People understand that things are spicy and if they are labeled as such, then they should not be accessible to all. People who enjoy spicy food do not want to taste mild food when they order spicy food. This is not spicy but it is a bit fruity and you do get a bit of chocolate, too. I was afraid that the chocolate was going to melt and ruin my infuser. It did not. That was a pro. Silver lining.

I've got a lot more of this to drink and I'm actually happy that the employee didn't reel me in with her line of "This is the last day we're going to have this. At eight tonight we are discontinuing it." Whether or not this is true, don't threaten me. That's not how to push product.

Now I'm not a religious man. I'm quite the opposite, but when I saw this bottle of tea staring me back in the face, I thought to myself, "My prayers have been answered." Now that's obviously just a turn of phrase and it's a whole lot more likely that Danny Wegman bugged my phone and heard me talking constantly about how much I, a Thirsty Dude, loves hibiscus tea.

Now, Danny in his excited and impatient ways did hear me correctly but didn't hear me entirely because as much as I love hibiscus tea, I love it with an asterisk.

The way that I like my hibiscus is with a little bit of flair. A little bit of spice. Just a hint of it. I've mentioned this many times but the Tazo Passion and the Panera hibiscus are the epitome of perfect, unsweetened teas. There is something else in there and I think that one of those things is cinnamon. Just a hint of it.

When you are stuck on an uninhabited tropical island the coconut is life. Due to it's salt, the ocean is death; drinking it would just lead to dehydration. You could keep yourself in healthy fluids by eating obscene amounts of tropical fruit, but that is just asking for more dysentery than a failed trip on the Oregon Trail. The only solution is to drink the pulpy, slightly chalky lifeblood for the coconut. You're going to have one hell of a time getting it open, but once you figure out a method, you're golden. Then and only then will you have the luxury of exploring the luxuries the island has to offer you. It could become your personal paradise.

When you get bored of the taste of straight coconut water, you can start mixing it with other fruits. Of course many of you would go straight for pineapples to create the classic pina colada flavor. For those of you who would like to pretend you're on this mystery island Vita Coco has packaged up it's own blend of a pina colada just for you. It's nothing but coconut water/pulp, pineapple pulp and vitamin C. Unfortunately they strain all of the solids out, so this is just a liquid with no fun involved.

This is not exactly the prime flavor for me, but it's something that I know a lot of people would love. There's something about Vita Coco that always leaves me wanting. Since it's just coconuts and juice I don't know what it is, but there is something that's just not as good as other brands, but it's more than good enough for you to enjoy.

Who really likes white chocolate and if you were the crazy person who does, would you choose that over regular chocolate? Would you rather have some sort of dumb, super sweet chocolate or some fantastic, handcrafted dark chocolate? What is white chocolate anyhow? Vanilla? Sorry to be the one to tell you, but vanilla already exists. You lost the race.

This, though, whatever it is...she's good. I polished off all one liter of it in one sitting and if it was larger, it would be inside of me. It's got a good taste and yes I did wish it were milk or dark chocolate the entire time. What flavor is it? Honestly, I don't know what white chocolate tastes like. I've had it but it's just kind of it's own dumb flavor. We don't need it. This we could do with. It's got whatever chocolate has but filled with seltzer. I like it. I don't like white chocolate. I'm torn.

"It tastes like drinking an orange." Jerome said. "That's because it's just a juiced orange." Paul said. "You could just call it orange juice." he added. "You know what? I will. Now and forever, this shall be called orange juice!" exclaimed Jerome.

Sometimes when you're working out in the old cranberry swamp you need to take some snacks with you. It can drive a person crazy to be working around a potential food all day, but it's not in a form that is easily ingested. It's these times you bring along a sack of grapes to help pass the time and sate your hunger. What happens when you become mister butter fingers and you drop all of your grapes into the bushel of cranberries you've just gathered? Well, it obviously doesn't result in you spending the time to separate the grapes out. You're too lazy and they certainly don't pay you enough for that. What happens in reality is that you end up with cran grape juice. That's nothing to complain about.

Grape juice is one of the best juices readily available in any grocery store across America. It's delicious, but it's a little strong and you can't drink much without getting an ache in your guts. It's so strong that it's one of the few juices that can overpower cranberry juice. This mostly tastes like a nice purple grape juice with a cranberry aftertaste. Each juice is normally intense and I couldn't drink more than a glass at a sitting. When they are combined by Ocean Spray I think I could drink a gallon for breakfast.

I should start by saying that what I wanted to drink today and review was a milk tea that Jay and I picked up with Editor Dan on some random trip to Toronto. What in the world were we doing there? Nothing? Just getting drinks? There had to be a reason why we went. Well anyway, that was last year and that milk tea expired in January of this year. Yes, January. We are now in September and this drink, containing milk, expired eight months ago. I thought it best to play it save, chalk it up as a loss, and drink something a little safer.

Which brings us to this drink. Once again, the lovable and beardable Editor Dan bought us a handful of drinks, this being one. I am an enormous fan of the Hint, Ayala, and infused waters. This, though, was different. What was different? Well, if you couldn't guess, it was carbonated. If you have ever drank a sparkling water, AKA "seltzer" you know that there is a strange almost bitterness to it. This contained that oddity. It's strange that if you add carbonation to regular water it tastes like you've carbonated water that has been sitting in a cup for a week at room temperature. This tastes like regular old seltzer water with watermelon flavoring. It's not as strong as say a Polar or Seagram's seltzer, which makes it "worse." "Worse" is a relative term but it's simply not as good.

If you're going to want infused water, get a regular Hint because they are pretty wonderful. If you want a sparkling Hint, stop wanting that and just get real seltzer water.

While I was visiting our local Co-Op here in Buffalo I ran into a friend who works there. He told me they just got in some weird carbonated coconut water. Of course my response was, “Ugh, that sounds terrible. Of course I'll buy it.” As I was cashing out my mind kept reeling about how it's ridiculous the amount of things that get carbonated. How could carbonated coconut water be refreshing? I know in Europe people drink carbonated water everywhere. Seriously, they give bands carbonated water on stage. I asked for still water and I was looked at as I was out of my mind. It's not refreshing at all.

Okay, so the point of all of this was I walked outside and cracked this can open to be pleasantly surprised that it was not carbonated; it was just a clever name. You know, H2O is water, so C2O is coconut water. I feel I could have easily figured that out by reading the can, but I took my friend's word.

I feared gross bubbly coconut garbage, but what I was delivered was a quite tasty, still coconut water. The only ingredient is 100% pure coconut water, so there's really not much room for it to go astray. On a side note can we all agree that plain coconut water is much better than the flavored varieties? They always end up tasting chalky and kind of wrong.

When I was in grade school I would wake up in the morning, eat a bowl of cereal, get ready for school and then pack my lunch. It was generally a ham sandwich with mustard, a juice box and a pack fruit snacks. When that was done I would make myself a beverage while I waited for the bus, which picked me up in front of my house. I was convinced that the weirder the stuff I drank the better off I would be. I would mix every beverage in the fridge and just down it. This included adding milk to everything, which as every scientist knows leads to curdling. That is what this drink reminds me of; adding a little milk to orange juice. The flavors separate from each other and the orange juice ends up not tasting like itself anymore. This isn't as gross as that, but since the ingredients are only coconut water and orange juice, I am left wondering what happened to the orange flavor. I'm guessing when they juiced it up the peel got into the mix. It tastes bitter, and neither coconut water, nor orange juice should taste that way. I think I fared better with my prepubescent cocktail mixtures.

Can we all agree that the beverage world has taken pomegranates and blueberries too far? It seems that nearly every company out there has that flavor in their line. Sure some of them add acai into the mix, but that's not really helping much. I understand the allure of antioxidants, but I'm just getting so tired of this flavor (orange mango is not that far behind). The thing is that these are flavors that I loved, and I was excited when they were more accessible in drink form, but enough is enough.

At least with this beverage V8 uses real juice, so it tastes like the fruit. They also mix in some other fruits (apples and white grapes) as well as some vegetables (sweet potatoes, purple carrots, tomatoes, and carrots), which give the drink a little something extra that makes it ticker and darker tasting. It's still primarily pomegranate and blueberry but you can certainly tell that there are some other flavors floating around in the mix.

If this were 5-10 years ago I probably been all over this drink, but it's too late in my beverage life to fully enjoy it the way that perhaps an eight year old would. Man, I wish I could enjoy this drink like he would. I also wish I could enjoy new music as much as he does. Looks like I'll be listening to R.E.M. for the millionth time and complain about how bands don't sound like this anymore. I'm old, it's my right.

Orange and gross. If you speed drink this, it might taste good. It does have a good initial orange juice taste but as soon as the orange goes down your gullet, it is promptly shoved, quite rudely out of the way, by a bitter taste. Do not for a split second think that this cacao has anything to do with chocolate because if it tasted like one of those fantastic orange chocolate balls, I would order a case of this. That is absolutely not the case and is actually the polar opposite.

You end up racing against that nondescript putrid taste by drinking and it's just an endless race. I checked the expiration date multiple times because I thought it had gone bad. Why wouldn't you just buy orange juice? That's all you want out of this drink is for it to taste like orange juice. The other stuff you can leave behind regardless of its healthy goodness. Eat a salad. Leave this on the shelf.

Some mornings you wake up and you inexplicably feel like garbage. You know, just run down and dehydrated. It's what I imagine a lesser hangover would feel like, except no alcohol was consumed. In fact, yesterday I didn't consume anything out of the ordinary, or do anything too crazy. Perhaps it's just that all the little stresses I put on my body have all collected and culminated in one day of feeling like doo doo.

To help combat this I'm taking it east and drinking some coconut water, as it's known for being a crazy hydrator. Luckily I had this carton of Cocozia on hand. It's all organic, and in fact the only ingredient is organic coconut water. There are no extraneous sweeteners added and no wacky flavors. This is 100% just pure coconut liquid. It's good, but to me there is not much difference between all of the non-sweetened coconut waters on the market, which keeps it from becoming outstanding. I would certainly drink it again, but in the increasingly competitive world of coconut water I'm afraid it would be lost in the crowd for normal consumers. I will say that it has helped me a bit in my time of need, and for that I will have some brand loyalty.

Mike's son, Max, refers to carbonated drinks as spicy water. That boy has apparently never had a bottle of Buchulife before. If he had he would know that this is the true spicy water. It's not spicy in a heat sort of way, but in a way that it smells as tastes of spice.

Out of everyone I had try this, I am the only one who actually enjoyed it. Friend of the site Dave said that it taste like carbonated anise water. While I don't agree, I can see where he's coming from. Mike says that it tastes like trees, and I can also see where he is getting that. This is herbal infused seltzer water, and the herbs give it a very specific taste that I simply can't place. It is also unsweetened, which lets all the weird flavors shine even more. It has a little bit of an anise flavor, but then again it also has the coolness of mint without any actual mint flavor. It's an odd taste for sure, but it's something that I enjoy more and more with every sip.

Recently Naked settled a class action lawsuit out of court and agreed to pay nine million dollars as reparation. The reason for all of this was that the company claimed that some of their products were all natural and free of genetically modified ingredients. Apparently they were a bunch of little liars since some of their products contained ascorbic acid, beta carotene, and D-calcium panthothenate. I had no idea those weren't natural ingredients, but that is what the news told me and when has the internet ever steered anyone wrong?

Naked was always my readily available “quality” juice of choice. I always thought it was better than it's competitors, but perhaps I was wrong. I also don't really care because the juice is still delicious and even with those ingredients it's still better than garbage made from concentrate with a butt-ton of sugar added to it. Yes my friends, I will continue to drink Naked, as I am doing right now with this bottle of Orange Mango juice.

This little guy right here, he doesn't fall under the lawsuit. There is nothing weird and unnatural added to this juice, just fruit that has been squished to hell to get its delicious lifeblood. This is orange, apple, mango and banana rolled into one, but in a way that you can only really taste the orange and the mango. Normally in juices like that it's more of an orange juice with a splash of mango in it, but here it's more of a 60/40 split. You can definitely taste the mango in a very strong fashion, and isn't that what everyone wants from juice with mango in it. No one is out there saying, “Man this is okay, but I wish it tasted more like oranges.” This is a good juice. Nah, this is a great juice. Don't let the lawsuit hold you back from enjoying it.