This is what I need.
I may be in the minority, but I love plain old carbonated mineral water like Perrier, San Pelligrino, and even Castle Rock. Bitter and bubbly!
With a touch of lime or lemon, awesome!
My best thirst quencher is “lime water”, ie lime juice in flat water, fairly dilute, no sugar. It’s not bad as a random thing to drink, but excels when you’re really thirsty.
It’s infinitely superior to any of the commercial lime-flavored waters and sodas which are mostly made with lime essence from the oil for some stupid reason. And while sugary limeade isn’t necessarily bad, commercial limeade is way too acidic.
As pleasant as Pocari Sweat is, 100 Plus is better, if nearly impossible to find outside of specialty SE Asia importers. It’s similar in flavor to Pocari Sweat, but lightly carbonated, and without the slightly greasy mouthfeel.
It’s the sports drink of choice of Malaysia and Singapore, whereas Pocari Sweat is from Japan. If there’s one thing the tropics knows, it’s refreshment.
Iced Barley Tea (Mugi-cha) is also a popular summertime drink in Japan and Korea. It has an earthy, slightly bitter flavor, which is a nice break from sweet drinks, and not being made of actual tea, doesn’t carry any caffeine. You can get large teabags cheaply at asian grocers or online, and make them by the pitcher just by cold-soaking for a couple hours.
Great stuff. I still prefer unsweetened iced black tea but barley tea has no caffeine. Normally that isn’t a big deal for me but I can drink a ton of iced tea.
HopTea is a canned sparkling tea + hops beverage. It’s very good but not cheap enough to keep on hand. If I still had a kegging system I’d try hopping and carbonating a barley tea!
I’d say 80-90% of my weekly non-food water intake is the Safeway-brand Cranberry-Raspberry sparkling water.
If they’re out of that, Blood Orange will do in a pinch.
I’m with you for the coconut water. Whole Foods brand is a really good tasting one that isn’t super expensive. Harmless harvest is my favorite as it is incredibly flavorful and a touch sweeter.
For me it’s Coke Zero. About 23 minutes in our freezer, almost to the second.
Maybe I should post this in the drunk thread? But I’m into it right now.
A truly refreshing drink is a good vodka and club soda on ice. No fruit. Nothing else.
It quenches your thirst. And it makes you happy. :)
I realize that a heroin smoothie would work as well. But I have no access to one of the main ingredients.
:)
Here in Canada, I always drink the PC Blue Menu Sparkling Water. Usually watermelon. Great taste, no sugar or calories.
We do that drink on the boat sometimes but with a small squeeze of a flavored Mio of some sort. Just enough that it freshens up the vodka soda. Alone it’s a bit too watery/fizzy and honestly dangerously like just chugging sparkling water.
I can’t find zero calorie Coke Starlight here locally in Canada
Starlight?
I’ve never seen it.
is this a Canada only thing?
I saw some at Wegmans in NoVa last week and I purchased a bottle, but it turned out to be the regular caloric version so I couldn’t drink it. I did find a zero cal version the week after and I had some. It taste interesting but nothing I want to drink long term.
Mmm… Cosmic radiation!
Unless it launched late in Canada I think you might have missed your window. It was everywhere here and I had a bunch but neither of my local gas stations (who were my sources) has any this week. The good news is, you didn’t miss much. IMO it just tasted like Coke Zero but with a hint of smokiness.
I found a bottle of Starlight Coke Zero at my local Shoppers Drug Mart (Vaughan). I drank it, but I hated myself after.
Got two bottles today. It tastes like disappointment.