Can they make an energy drink that actually tastes good?

I had always thought Red Bull was the hallmark ‘awful tasting pep drink’. But I guess other soft drinks are nosing in on Red Bull’s territory. So here’s the (limited) rundown of what I’ve tried and a description of how it tasted.

Red Bull: It tasted like carbonated cough syrup. Sometimes I’ll get a Red Bull+Vodka (occasionally called a ‘Raging Bull’). The great thing about this is that the cheapy vodka they often use actually takes the edge off the taste of the Red Bull. So it tastes like acoholic carbonated cough syrup (a bit more palpable :wink: )

Rockstar: I tried one of these this morning, to help pep me up for a 2 hour drive back home. The taste was startlingly medicine-y. It is hard to describe; the closest thing I can think of is that it tastes like the flourine rinse stuff they made me swish around for a minute during the hygenist’s appointment (even my dentist has been gracious enough to replace that awful tasting flourine swill with a flavored foamy flourine product). It is so unpleasantly bizarre, I actually laughed out loud in the car marvelling how they could cram a sixteen ounce can with so much…bleh. Also amusing is my friend’s roomate drinks like 12 of those things a day. I have no idea how she can choke them down. :stuck_out_tongue:

Power Bar: Haven’t tried it yet, but honestly I’m kind of leery about a Power Bar in liquid form. Do they just puree it into a sludge? I actually like the taste of Power Bars themselves, they’re pleasantly chewy/crispy.

still waiting for chocolate fudge in a can

Full Throttle.

Then again, Coke was passing them out free to everyone with a pulse on campus. (And some of us got 3 cans of it).

Everyone in the Role Playing Game Group (me included) decided to take coke up on the offer. We are sitting around, knocking it back, and I comment that you don’t see “Surge” anymore. Then nearly everyone else claims that Full Throttle is Surge Redux.

3 bucks per 16 ounce can. But other than that…

Bawls is good - kind of like super-fruity Sprite.

If you’re more of a cola person, Jolt packs a definite punch, and tastes only slightly off from Pepsi.

How 'bout Starbucks Double Shot Espresso’s . It’s not carbonated, but it’ll get the blood flowing through your veins at very appeasing speeds.

I’ve become addicted to Sobe’s “No Fear.” Even the sugarfree version is kickass.

Of course for $2.50 a bottle ($1.50 at Marc’s!! yay!) it only kicks my ass a coupla times a week.

Does well for muscle soreness - or so I have tricked my body to believe.

Over the weekend, I became very fond of SoBe Adrenaline Rush. I was at the Richmond races, and I knew that I would be drinking. I packed a few cans in along with the beer and bottles of ice. After a couple of beers, it was a nice little pick-me-up, sort of along the lines of a coffee, and it got the stale beer and cigarette taste out of my mouth, if only for a moment. :wink:

It wasn’t nearly as sweet as the crap I got a last year. In fact, it was rather good. I got the sugar free one Friday because of past experience, and it was tasty. On the beer run the next day, I picked up the regular kind, and it was good too.

In the UK, Purdeys tastes good, but isnt very widely available.

http://www.trevreav.co.uk/Visuals%20popup/purdeys.html

MiM

I don’t know how you got past the first sip; I know I didn’t. It was like Mountain Dew, Sprite Remix and ten other flavors all merged into one. It was sweet enough to knock you out and just the right combination of flavors to be gross. Maybe that was the point?

Then again, I drink Mountain Dew daily.

I like the coke flavored Rockstar. It doesn’t quite taste like regular coke, but it’s not too far off. It got me through quite a few all-nighters.

Does Guinness count? That gives you energy, although mostly the energy to drink more Guinness.

Czech ‘Semtex’ is the main Red Bull competitor and tastes pretty good.

There is also ‘Erektus’ (with a caveman-type drawing of a guy with an erection) that tastes like crap…nasty nasty stuff.

No idea how widely available it is, but Lucozade tastes nice. Not sure what flavour it can be described as, quite sweet orange?

A friend tried this once and referred to it as “putrid in a can”.

Personaly I like the taste of Adrenalin Rush from SoBe, it is more citrus than red bull or rockstar.

This is a big if, but if you like the taste of Mountain Dew (sometimes I can stand it) then Amp isn’t too bad. I only got them because I stopped at a gas station once that had them on sale for two for $1!

I got ten of them, since I sometimes feel the need for caffinne in the morning, but don’t drink coffee.

Perhaps. But if so, you’ll probably have to include Anheuser Busch’s B[sup]E[/sup] (B to the E)

Lies! I like the stuff, but only if it’s cold. Like… cold cold. Kind of like the bottled Frappacinos.

Then again, neither is as good as you’d find in a coffee shop, but eh.

I reccomend you give it a try yourself. I’ve had plenty of them and think they’re pretty tasty. Does your friend dislike coffee, or likes coffee so much that anything not gourmet is considered drek? I’m only asking this because to me the Double Shot Espresso doesn’t taste too different from something you’d buy in a Cafe.

No Fear isn’t bad - very mango-y. I think that the diet version of Rock Star is significantly better than the regular kind - much less intense, tastes pretty good. I could drink 6 or 7 Starbucks doubleshots in about 10 minutes - they’re sooo tiny, but taste good!

George