Liquid Refreshment

Ocean State Job Lot’s drinks department is not as robust as their snack food or dessert sections, but they have interesting stuff form time to time. CTMQ stalkers may remember a long lost page I used to maintain wherein I drank all sorts of awful (usually) Asian drinks. This will make you yearn for that page to return. (It won’t – I deleted it all.)

Go to the latest addition(s)!

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Thai Tea:

Provenance: Thailand
Price: $.75
Odd Ingredient: “Full Cream Milk Powder”
Sugar content 48 grams!
Tagline: “Taste Nirvana”

I still can’t get behind these Asian soy drinks. I don’t know what it is about them; their grassy flavor? Hoang can drink them down, yet I cannot, no matter how long I’m married to an Asian. I couldn’t do more than a few sips of this orangey, sweet, mess. It didn’t taste like tea – or “Nirvana” at all, unless then mean what Kurt Cobain’s heroin socks tasted like.

Verdict: Frickin’ Terrible

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Provenance: Las Vegas
Price: $.75
Odd Ingredient: “Rhodiola Rosea Root PE”
Sugar content 31 grams!
Tagline: “Put a little Swagger in You”

I hate energy drinks. They all suck and they are all loaded with sugar and caffeine. And the worst part, of course, is that they are marketed to minors. I’ve had one called “Cocaine,” but I give the nod to “Chupacabra” for the cooler name.

This flavor was Lime zest, however, the ingredients noted no lime at all. And that’s weird. I didn’t really hate this drink as much as many of the others I’ve tasted, but come on, it’s Hi-C Ecto Cooler with more sugar and caffeine and fizz.

Verdict: Frickin’ Ok.

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Caf Fusion Vanilla Vortex:

Provenance: New Jersey, I think
Price: $.75
Odd Ingredient: [I tossed the can, sorry]
Sugar content [I tossed the can, sorry]
Tagline: “Reach critical mass”
Pruchased: Bloomfield, 9/17/14

Everything about this screams “awful,” from the labeling to the font to the tagline. But whatever – 75 cents for a jolt of caffeine can’t be all bad, can it?

Aha! you expected me to say yes! This stuff is ok; way too sweet, of course, but the “vortex” of vanilla (most likely artificial) wasn’t overpowering and the coffee flavor came through. No, I didn’t finish half of this stuff, but I did have like 3 swallows, which is 2 more than usual for this class of OSJL foodstuff.

Verdict: Frickin’ Ok.

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