Organic Evaporated Cane Juice - 102 Reviews

I'm happy to announce that Bhakti Chai has made its way to Buffalo, NY and I can now purchase it whenever I want to have an intense experience. If you think you know what chai is all about because you've ordered it from Starbucks before you are in for a wild ride with this company. The spices and ginger used in these teas are much more pronounced in order to try and recreate the traditional chai of India and not the watered down American version. I understand that this is not a drink for everyone, but I certainly love it. It borderline hurts to drink this, and I love Bhakti for it.

This is the Semi Sweet version of the beverage, and as you would expect it tastes exactly like the original, only not as sweet. I prefer this version, because who needs that much sugar?

Also, in a moment of brilliance I decided to add some of this to the pancake batter I was making and bam chaicakes, your new favorite breakfast food. I know I will be making them again soon.

I think I've reached the point where I am more often disappointed by hibiscus drinks than I am stoked about them. To clarify, I still think they are more than tasty, but the first couple that I ever tried blew my socks off and that is the barometer that I go by. It's not really fair because those original drink had other spices added to them and this like most other beverages of this specific flavor tend to be just straight hibiscus added to tea or in this case lemonade. These just can't compete to the spiced goodness of say a True Brew tea.

What we have here is mostly lemonade with a light hibiscus taste. The level of hibiscus is rivaled by the weird plastic taste from the bottle. I don't know what makes some drinks taste like that. The bottle says it's BPA free. Oh well this is still decent enough. I want more, but what I want was never really on the menu, so I can't really be upset.

I've been all about iced chai lattes this summer. I got one on a whim when I met a friend at a coffee shop about a month ago and I knew it would be the summer drink for me. I tend to make them at home with some fancy loose leaf chai that I have, but to tell you the truth no matter how good it is it's never as good as I want it to be. Enter Bhakti Chai and it's a whole new world. This is the strongest chai tea I have ever had and that is the way this drink should be. A lot of chai tea ends up pretty smooth, but this really packs a punch. It's black tea with spices, a healthy serving of ginger and a bit of soy milk. Each sip is a strong shot of spices that fade out into a mellow burn. I'm weird and I like a little discomfort in my drinks. This delivers what I need. Also, the fact that they use pressed ginger instead of a powder really makes a difference.

I've never had a chai tea outside of my house or a local coffee shop. This could be how it's traditionally done and I could be completely ignorant of that. If that's the case I need to drink more of the “real stuff.”

I had a whole dumb thing written about how the U2 song from Batman Forever was actually about this tea, and then I double checked and realized that the word tease is nowhere in the title and I'm just a dumb dummy. Well that threw my sad excuse for comedy out the window.

Now for once I'll just be straight with you. This is a more than decent honey green tea. It's a bit on the sweeter side of the spectrum, but it doesn't wander into the territory of “How can people drink this?” It's actually got a nice sweetness if a sweetened tea is what you're looking for. You can still taste the green tea beneath the sweetener, the honey and the fruit flavors.

What I like the most about this is that TEAse didn't feel the need to pound the pomegranate and acai flavors into our faces. They are two flavors that are normally very strong in the beverages they are found in, but in here there are fairly light. They add just a touch of flavor to the tea and that is how I like my teas flavored. Sure I could have done with a bit less sweetener, but I'm not everyone and a lot of people like their teas sweet. This is for them and I think they will really enjoy it.

Jim doesn't get sick often but when he does, he gets really sick. He can stay healthy during multiple cold and flu seasons but out of the blue, he'll get it and it hits him hard with all of the symptoms of a cold or flu to the fullest extent. It usually puts him out for two or three days. People call him a wimp about it but truth is, Jim has a far better immune system than them because he's only sick one time for every three times they're sick.

One of those seasons was upon us and Jim caught it and caught it badly. He had a head cold and couldn't breathe and was blowing his nose every twenty minutes. He just wanted to sleep. He thought about how he usually felt better when he drank orange juice but didn't have any. He went to a corner store by his house and bought a lemonade. He thought that if Vitamin C came from oranges it would come from lemons, too. He brought home a new type of lemonade that he had never tried before because of the nice packaging and the fact that there were no preservatives and he had to shake it before he drank it.

In all his sickness, he took a big sip and loved it. Everything tasted like styrofoam until now. He could taste the lemonade and the lemons and the sugar. It was like he woke up from a deep sleep to be in a technicolor dream world. He could taste the lemons and they were both bitter and sour just like a fresh lemon is.

Although still sick, Jim felt better for a limited time. He knew that all the soup wouldn't make him feel as good as a nice, fresh glass of that lemonade would.

Everyone knows about the crunchy, organic hippies. The new ones are just jealous that they missed the entirety of the sixties and all the movements and music and drugs so they think that by juggling in public parks, not showering and putting "Ithaca Is Gorges" stickers on their Prius that they can feel the same thing. Those are the same people that sell Ziplok bags of organic granola for like twelve dollars a bag and won't make eye contact when you ask what's in it. Then there is the other kind.

The other kind made this drink. They are smart scientists and experimentalists that use science and logic to make things smarter, better and better for you. This drink is clearly a pride project and you can taste it with every sip. There are not many ingredients in there and every ingredient you would feel just fine giving to a child. It's some of the strongest, most sour and tart lemonade I have ever drank. There is stuff on the bottom with a nice strawberry taste. I didn't get a lot of mint but the competition is fierce in that little bottle. The lemons are just teaming up and destroying everything. It might have made alright with the strawberry and let him hang out for a bit but not without putting up a fight. Make no mistake; this is lemonade first and foremost. It's just lightly flavored with strawberry and even lighter with mint. Someone with a finer palate than I might be able to make it out more. It's definitely a "grandma's backyard mint" and not an "off the shelf" mint.

Everything was done right in this drink and if I had one complaint, it would be that they told me to "shake well" which I did. Upon opening I was greeted by a geyser similar so something you would see and an ICP show. Out of habit I would give it a little jostle every now and then and would be punished time and time again by doing so. I don't know what's going on in that bottle behind the scenes but I think that it rhymes with "witchcraft."

It saddens me to say that I don't see this company lasting very long. I wish them nothing but a bright future, but I don't think America is ready for semi-sweet lemonade. Even health conscious people I know prefer their lemonade with a nice serving of sugar in it. This line of lemonades just doesn't meet the acceptable minimum sweetener that people are likely to embrace. Personally I enjoy it; it's nothing but water, lemon juice, Meyer lemon juice (a cross between a lemon and a mandarin), and evaporated cane juice, but it doesn't quite get me to where I want to go. I do appreciate the ever so faint orange taste from the Meyer lemon, but it's just not enough. As I have written about before I have preconceived notions when it comes to lemonade, and as much as I wish I could be satisfied with a lower sugar content, the junkie in me needs its fix.

Sometimes your preconceived notions on how something should be are not always the best. In the world I have embraced lemonade is a beverage that is overly sweet and at the same time also tart. It's the child in me that craves this as a refreshing summer beverage. The thing is who decided that is what lemonade should be? We've been conditioned to expect that, the same with the sweetness of soda. If from a young age we were given versions of these beverage with little to no sugar, that is what we would see as the norm, and I'm sure it's what we would crave.

This bottle of Sweet'tauk is how I wish lemonade was introduced to me. If you take out the added blackberry and ginger flavors, all that is in this bottle is water, lemon juice and evaporated cane juice. The results are very different than what you are used to. There is more of a tartness to it, but it's not even close to an extent that would make it hard to drink. It tastes like lemonade with less sugar, because that it what it is. I'd be lying if I said my body didn't wish there was more sugar in here, but my brain, who runs the show, knows that I don't need all that excess sweetener and it's happy for the lack of it. I want to have grown up on this. I want this to be what my body expects when it wants lemonade. I certainly have a sweet tooth that I'm working on kicking, and this would fit right into my ideal sugar-intake world.

A downfall of their being less sugar is that the berry flavor is not as exaggerated. Again this is something I could get used to, and there is enough berry in there for me not to question its naming. I do wish the ginger was more present in burn as it is in flavor, but you can't always get what you want. I understand that the majority of people out there don't want their beverages to hurt them when they drink them, so I can accept it for what it is and what is it is what our past should have been.

Ahh green tea. Ahh coffee fruit. Two antioxidant powerhouses teaming up to fight disease and make you healthier. This is like a Marvel/DC Comics crossover episode. You know, like when the Flintstones and Jetsons got together and blew each other's minds as well as most of America's. Ironically, Wilma and Betty were trying to convince Fred to go to Honalurock. Anyhow, so, I don't know, Spiderman and Batman and Superman for good measure or something get together and destroy all the bad guys in one action packed afternoon.

That's what happening here. Coffee fruit, which doesn't have a strong taste and whatever taste it does have tastes nothing like coffee, and green tea, a taste you should know and love, mush up together in order to bring you a lightly sweetened drink with all the benefits of the ingredients. I wish this little bottle was bigger but I suppose I shouldn't overload on antioxidants. My body might not know what to do with all of the troops at arms.

I can feel myself getting stronger. I feel like I can...lift...this...table...oh I think I pulled something.

The base behind all of the Vemma drinks is mangosteen. It's their shtick and they use it in their energy drinks as well as their protein beverages. I like mangosteen, and everyone needs a gimmick. I didn't expect it to be in this meal replacement powder, but there it is. Oh well.

Do Americans eat more than they should? I'm going to say that in 98% of cases, absolutely. I certainly do. I try not to, and most of the time I fail. I love food, even though most of the time I just eat it for sustenance, I just enjoy the process of eating for some weird reason. I find it relaxing. I also really enjoy foods that generally don't have protein (fruits and breads) so I don't feel full as quick. Now that I'm getting older and I realize that I need to take better care of myself, I'm trying to cut down the whole eating too much thing. These shakes are designed just for that. They are protein heavy meal supplements that are meant to help curb your intake of too much food.

The first thing I found weird about this drink is that you are supposed to mix the powder with water. I had a carton of unsweetened almond milk out and ready to go, and when I checked to see how much to use I saw that it said water, which resulted in me going “huh.” In my opinion the water makes this a bit strange. It causes the drink to become slimier than creamy and smooth, which is what I expect from these types of drinks. It seemed that in every sip the water was fighting to separate itself from the powder. Even though I mixed the hell out of it, it did not want to work as a cohesive unit.

Flavor wise it tasted like a watery chocolate drink. The chocolate flavor was pretty decent and it didn't have that gritty protein drink texture, nor the protein taste. It also did a good job mostly covering up the taste of the stevia. I can see where they get the ice cream name. It tastes a bit like a melted ice cream come made for diabetics.

I wasn't completely blown away by this, but I didn't hate it either. I'm not really who this is marketed towards, because I'm not battling my weight, but I think it could be very beneficial to those who are.

What a misleading bottle. When I came across this in a gas station in Ann Arbor, MI I thought that it was some kind of weird functional weight loss beverage. It has that certain look about it that I associate with such drinks. The fact that it says “Natural Metabolism Booster” fairly large at the top and “A Wellness Drink” at the bottom only solidified my thoughts. The thing about solids is that sometimes they melt. There is nothing fancy about this drink at all. It's not a cure all, a meal supplement, nor will it cure baldness. What is contained in this bottle is simply a cane sugar sweetened green tea with honey and ginseng in it.

When you break it down, there is not much difference between this and an Arizona's green tea, with the exception of a better sweetener and probably higher quality versions of the ingredients. It tastes like a fairly sweet green tea with honey and ginseng, which is exactly what it is. I don't know why they went over the top with the packaging. If I didn't need to review this for Thirsty Dudes, I would have passed right over it, which would have been a shame, because it has a nice taste to it that I thoroughly enjoy.

Let us start a petition to get lemons removed as the standard for flavoring water in restaurants. Lemons are overrated. They are low on the totem of citrus. I'm not exactly sure what is at the top; maybe blood oranges. Oh man, a nice slice of blood orange in your water would be fantastic. I am a realistic man though, and I know that's never going to happen right off the bat. Lets take baby steps and start off with limes. They are of close relation to the lemon; they even look the same, except green. I know they will still carry the same gross bacteria from improper storage and preparation, but at least it will taste a bit better.

If you're wondering what it would be like, because you don't understand how your imagination works, mix a packet of True Lime into a glass of water. It's pretty much the same thing as squeezing a slice of the actual fruit. Who needs imagination anyway?

There are trace amounts of cane sugar in this for some reason. I'm 99.9% sure the True Lemon doesn't have that, and I'm not exactly sure why it's in here. It doesn't taste sweet, but it gives me the illusion that this is the world's most watered down limeade. I just don't understand why it's necessary. Let the citrus do it's work, without assistance. It has to learn some how.

Rumors have been circulating about where I have been. People have said that I was in China selling cows. I have heard that I had left Thirsty Dudes in order to work full time to fulfill my dream of becoming a professional competitive pie eater. I have also heard that I was being groomed to become the newest host of the late night television show "Mike Night with Mike." I can say, for sure, that these are all false.

Regardless of what I was doing, which you don't care about anyway, let's be honest, I'm back in full effect with this, a thrilling review of a drink that is supposed to get my metabolism boosted. Look, I'm thirty-one years old and don't have the metabolism that I had when I was a terribly haired, equally terribly dressed high school student. That being said, I do not believe that this is going to give me the endurance that would allow me to do things like get three hours of sleep and just rage all day. As a terribly, immature adult, this does quench my thirst because it is good. It doesn't have a strong tea taste. Light tea taste. Not strong. Strong berry taste. According to the pictures on the bottle, there are cherries (which I can taste), blueberries (which I cannot taste), strawberries (which I might be able to taste) and raspberries (which I also might be able to taste). That's a good fifty percent tasty fruit to tasteless fruit. I suppose it's a fair ratio.

Hey, regardless of what seedy or otherwise not terribly entertaining things I've been up to these past five days, I'm back and this review proves it. I'm off to continue my new career of playing as a rodeo clown but you don't care about that.

It's no secret that the three of us here at Thirsty Dudes do not partake in alcoholic beverages. We're not jerks about it, it's just not for us. To paraphrase, “You're fun is not our fun.” When RESQWATER sent us some samples, we contemplated what to do. In the past we have had some friends get wasted and drink the product and give us a review of how it worked with us touching base about the flavor. It was a fun exercise, but to be honest it took a long time to come to fruition. People are busy, and our friends are older and not getting wasted all the time, we get it.

For this review we decided to take it another way. If I understand things correctly, a big part of what makes a hangover is dehydration. To mimic this, I ate obscene amounts of salsa with chips that were far to salty to be anything close to healthy, but tasted so darn good. In the past this combination has led me to feeling like crap the following morning, and I was told that I had the same symptoms of a hangover. So I did what I had to in order to replicate the scenario, you know like a reenactment on some crime show that is always on the TV. Yes, I know this is not exactly the same, but it's what we did, so deal with it.

I can tell you, my experiment worked. After being a complete glutton last night, I woke up feeling like cold diarrhea on a paper plate. Ugh. I got up sat around for a short while and then downed a bottle of RESQWATER.

First off, this does not smell pleasant. Actually maybe it's not all that unpleasant of a scent, but it's not what I want to smell when I'm about to drink something. It's something like a combination of fruit, vitamins, some sort of marinade and possibly meat. It's a weird smell that I was not expecting at all. The smell vaguely translates into the taste, but luckily it's not in a vomit inducing way. Mostly it tastes like a Vitamin Water version of prickly pear, but with a slightly stronger flavor. There is a bit of an adult vitamin taste to it as well, but it's sweet enough to mostly bury it.

This could be much worse, but overall it's nothing that I would drink for pleasure, which I assume wouldn't be the healthiest decision anyways. I would certainly drink it again if I ever woke up feeling like I did today. It didn't take all that long for my body to start feeling normal again after downing this. For all of you prone to hangovers due to your late night decisions, I suggest you keep a supply of this on hand.

Are you an adult that loves the taste of Strawberry Quik? Well let me ease that mind of yours and let you in on a little tip that will not only allow you to bath your tongue in the flavor that you crave, but also do it in a healthier manner. You see Odwalla's Strawberry Protein Monster tastes exactly like that treat from your childhood that you miss so dearly. Sure it's a little denser of a liquid, but that is a small price to pay for not looking like you're stuck in arrested development when you're trying to flirt with your cashier at the grocery store. Who could take someone seriously when they are buying a big tin of strawberry powder to flavor their milk? No one, that is who. On the other hand if you were purchasing this beverage, you will appear to have your act together, and it might even get you that cashier's number. Actually don't be the creep that bothers the cashier. They just want to make it through their shift as painlessly as possible. Just drink your strawberry drink and keep to yourself.

We can all agree that green tea is great, correct? Out of all the teas in the world that I have tasted it can stand the highest on it's own; no sweeteners, no added flavors, just tea leaves boiled in water and left to cool. It's wonderful, it's refreshing and it's all I really need. I mean I like more, but I don't need it.

I'm assuming with their Tea Water line Arizona is trying to make a lighter tea, that doesn't have as many calories as their regular line, but doing so without using zero calorie sweeteners that effect the taste a lot, no matter what anyone says. I appreciate what they are going for here. There is almost always far too much sugar in drinks these days, and I certainly enjoy a light tea. What I have a problem with was the solution they came up with. They may have started using a lower tea to water ratio so that it was a weaker tea and added less sugar to the result, but I'm willing to wager that they brewed a regular batch of their green tea and watered it down to nearly nothing. The end result is a watered down tea that is slightly sweet, but in the way that tastes like you watered it down yourself, not before it was sweetened. The small amount of sugar used tastes stretched out. I imagine the sugar feels like Marty McFly when his hand starts fading away. It's uncertain as to whether it will still exist at all by the end of the bottle.

I myself prefer a stronger tea, but I have no major qualms with the weaker variety. It is my humble belief that they should have forgone the sweetener altogether. The use of no sweetener as compared to very little washed out sweetener would have made this far more enjoying. It wouldn't have seemed like they were trying to pull one over on the consumer by just stretching their beverages. They could have watered down the tea a bit more to keep the Tea Water name. I'm sure that was a marketing ploy. In a world where Vitamin Water reigns supreme at gas stations, something called “Tea Water” would probably spark more interest then something that says “Unsweetened Tea.”

I will say that I do really enjoy the yumberry flavor to this. Light everything in the drink it's light. I appreciate that this is all organic and it's really that trace amount of sugar that is bringing this whole line down.

I don't remember these ever being in stores. They were always just on sale at a "bargain basement" type place. I love those places. It's like the graveyard for forgotten drinks. Well some are forgotten, some are overstock, and some are plain gross.

I have also drunk three of these without reviewing them. Why? Because I had them and the timing wasn't right. No, the timing wasn't right. Yeah, I just quoted Big D and the Kids Table. Warped Tour is tomorrow and although I won't be there, they will and kids will (hopefully) enjoy them.

Sure, Warped Tour is what made me fall in love with Hansen's, I guarantee that this Arizona Tea Water would have been better for me. It's super low in calories and really, without exaggeration, just tastes like really watered down, sweet green tea. I found it refreshing and it had just enough flavor that it wasn't like I used an old cup of something and didn't have time to clean it out, an action that is pretty my speed.

All you kids have fun at Warped Tour this summer. It's going to be hot and everyone is going to be sweaty. Drink lots of water and have a good time. Also, you are running out of time to listen to the back catalog of Goldfinger, Reel Big Fish, The Aquabats, and The Ataris so you can successfully sing along.

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've been holding onto this for a bit, just waiting for the right time when I needed a nice chocolate fix and a little pick me up after going to the gym. The chocolate fudge Orgain was great. It had a great fancy chocolate taste. It didn't taste like milk chocolate garbage that you get at Easter. I knew this wasn't going to be as strong in that department, but I expected a nice strong mocha flavor. The picture of the chocolate shavings on the packaging look just like what I needed today. Instead what I got was a whole lot of milk with a bit of dark chocolate to it, and the faintest hints of coffee. Yes, I did shake it up, twice in fact. I was hoping the flavor was hiding at the bottom, but it was not meant to be.

One thing this does have going for it is that it's a high protein drink that doesn't taste chalky, and doesn't have a thick consistency. It has that going for it. I never would expect this to be a protein drink. I would expect for it to be a mediocre mocha drink. For that it gains extra points.

Thirsty Dudes have a friend called "The Hammer." The Hammer is a great man who has affection for good, high quality chocolate. "Do you want to try a square?" he says to me. I never deny. Why? It's chocolate, number one, but it's always and definitely good chocolate because he only buys the good stuff. If he were with me right now, at my desk at work, I would have him drink this with me. This is chocolate milk for adults. It's bitterer than chocolate milk and has a natural taste to it. It's more woody and chalky than you would expect a generic chocolate milk to be so for that reason, you might not like it. I like it. The mint version is a bit more "entry level" if you ask me, but I think this one is good, too. The qualities of a good chocolate aren't always what make a good chocolate drink, though. Like I said, it's good, but it is going to be a bit more bitter than people might like. Still sweet but not as creamy as the kids would like. Hence chocolate milk for adults.