Wonderfarm Bird's Nest White Fungus Drink

I saw this in the soda/juice section of an Asian grocery store and I new I had to try it. I don't think it's a soda, but look at it. How could I not try a drink with the name "Wonderfarm Bird's Nest White Fungus Drink"

And for the record the ingredients list says it contains "water" "rock sugar" "white fungus" and yes "bird nest". Not sure what kind of bird nests. But if nothing else, this should be interesting, and will mean I'm also eating bird poop, probably?

Appearance

I really like the can design! The color choices are cute, and the frame around the name is neat, and the little detailing around the border. It's a really classic design.

Appearance Score

7/10, the little birds are cute too

Taste

It smells a little bit like milkis, the yogurt soda. It has a mild sweet smell to it. The first sip was really good. Great, in fact! It was sweet, and mild and nice. The second sip was not nearly as nice. The taste changed dramaticly and I got a chunk of something. I have no idea what. It tastes like sweet coconut water left out in the sun for a week. It's pretty sweet, but in a gross old way. It tastes a little rotten. It's interesting, but I'm not a big fan.
 I poured it out into the sink, and I wish I had taken a picture. The chunks were huge! And they looked like flaked off pig skin! Or sunburn peelings. I'm glad it was in an opaque can, otherwise I probably wouldn't have drank it.

Taste Score

3/10. Pretty gross

Lester Fixin's Buffalo Wing Soda

Ho boy. Buffalo Wing Soda. This is my first foray into a savory soda. I'm a little apprehensive. But who knows, it could be really special. So I'll try it. How bad could it be? Spoilers: really bad

Appearance

Slogan reads. "Y'all get yer fixins"

You know what this reminds me of? The label reminds me of when restaurants put really poor quality photos of the food next to it's name and prices in the menu. Sometimes it makes the food look appealing, but most of the time it's rather unappetizing. But, at least you know whats inside the container, right?

Appearance Score

3/10, not doing it for me.

Taste

Hooo boy. I cracked it open. It smells sweet. I'm not sure how sweet will work with savory soda. It smells faintly of A1 steak sauce. A little onion-y and... raisins? Am I smelling raisins? What's up with that? And the taste! Oh god, the taste. It's really sweet. And it tastes like onions. There's a little spicy bite in the back of the throat, which is interesting but not in a good way. And there is this prevailing overpowering taste of stale bazooka bubble gum. This  is not a good soda. This is a bad soda. Sure it's novel. And it's cute, what their trying to do. But it's really bad. Like Offensively bad. I have never disliked a soda this much.

Taste Score

1/10. It get's 1 point for trying something new.

Combine the pumpkin pie soda with the wings soda to create sadness!

Lester's Fixins Pumpkin Pie Soda

I was out about the town with some friends of mine, and one friend purchased a couple of these Lester's Fixins sodas. It's obviously a novelty brand, and they had sodas like "peanut butter and jelly" and "sweet corn". So, if nothing else, this will be interesting.

Appearance

If you look closely, you'll notice this was taken in a chipotle. Great lighting.

This is the appearance of a soda that your sweet old grandpa would make in his basement. It's a plain glass bottle that you can buy in bulk. It's a hastily slapped on labeled with a big picture of what it's supposed to be. Honest. Simple. A little poor quality. A little word art-y. Pretty pixely. But it comes with a little picture of the titular Lester, so that's cute?

Appearance Score

3/10, nothing special.

Taste

The soda is so orange it looks like orange soda. I'm trying this at room temperature, so this might not be the best representation of itself this soda has to offer, so I'll give it that lee way. The soda smells a little spicy, which is interesting. It has a spicy taste too, a little like cloves, but not quite. It is faaar too sweet. And it's not pumpkin-y at all. It tastes a lot like bubble gum and is most definitely not a good representation of pumpkin pie. Or a good representation of a decent soda.

Taste Score

3/10, I would not voluntarily drink it

Fentamins Curiosity Cola

I'm slowly working my way to completion of all the Fentamins sodas. Today I'm trying the Curiosity Cola. I am not a big fan of cola. It tastes like medicine to me and I rarely, if ever, drink it voluntarily. What I'm saying is, in the coke vs. pepsi debate, I am firmly on the side of neither. But it's Fentamins, so it has to be good, right?

Appearance

 

I feel like me scoring the appearance of Fentamins sodas is completely redundant at this point. They're all in the same bottle! So, as usual, the bottle is gorgeous and classic and blah blah blah.

Appearance Score

9/10, no one is surprised.

Taste

This is a tough one. It smells like a more mature version of Coca Cola. It tastes like an authentic cola. Like if cola went back to it's "hand crafted" roots and was made with simple and high quality ingredients. This is what it would taste like. I promise I'm not a fentamins shill. It's refreshing. It's sweet, but well balanced. But I'm just not a fan of cola. So I didn't love it. But if you like cola, this is an excellent example.

Taste Score

5/10?

Fentimans Mandarin and Seville Orange Jigger

Another one of the fentimans. I have a lot to get through.

Appearance

The soda is a brilliant orange. It's really quite pretty. And, obligatory, the bottle is gorgeous.

Appearance Score

9/10

Taste

The taste is reminiscent of my favorite childhood drink, the "wave bender". A wave bender is orange juice with seltzer or sprite and grenadine. It's delicious, and I make it for myself anytime I have the ingredients. The jigger is very similar to that, with the hint of bitter seltzer and a nice round grenadine-ish start. At the end, though, it tastes more adult and alcoholic. Probably because the ginger in it is fermented. You know. Logically like that. Overall, its excellent.  

Taste Score

8/10 Pretty Good. I like it a lot.

Fentimans Victorian Lemonade

I recently took part in the Reddit Arbitrary Day gift exchange. In this exchange you get the user name and basic information of someone random, and you get to look through their post history and do some stalking and buy them a gift you think they will like. Boy, did I hit the jack pot. My gifter looking through the entire history of my blog and got me 10 Fentimans sodas, in addition to a great book. He got me 6 rose lemonades, probably because I enjoyed the last one so much. 2 Victorian lemonades, and 2 Mandrin and Seville Orange Jiggers. Today I'm gonna review the lemonade, and next week will be the mandrin.

Look at 'em all!

Appearance

The fentimans bottles are nothing if not classy looking. I should start a collection for storing stuff and displaying flowers.

Not shown: my eternal joy and gratitude

Appearance Score

9/10 Man I love their bottles. 

Taste

I was expecting the taste to be almost identical to the rose lemonade. Its not even close actually. The rose lemonade is sweet and light and floral. The Victorian lemonade is a punch to the mouth of flavor. It's like limonata, extremely tart and mature tasting, but more intense. I love all of it. It has a great sweetness that doesn't stick around to long, and the lemon really shines through. It tastes almost fermented so on the front edge of the taste you kind of have an earthy tang on the back of the throat. There is a dusting of pulp in the bottom of the glass too. You can see all the ginger and lemon zest floating around.
Fentimans has made an amazing and complex and interesting product here. Go out and try some.

Taste Score

9/10 Delicious, amazing, I wantmore

Lorina Strawberry

Lorina is a french company established in 1895 best known for it's lemonade. I recieved 3 bottles of Lorina soda for my birthday, so let's try them out.
This is their website. I don't recommend going there, through, because it has very intrusive flash.

Appearance

I like the shape of the bottle. It's very handsome. I'm not the biggest fan of the labeling, it seems due for an update. 

The Strawberry soda has a lovely rose color. I thought it deserved a more sophisticated container.

There we go.

Appearance Score

5/10

Taste

It's not bad. It's not mind blowing, but it's defiantly not bad. It has a nice strawberry flavor. There's a lot of carbonation, but the bubbles are tiny, and they fill your mouth very pleasantly. It's very french tasting. The aftertaste is a little sticky, but not bad.

Taste Score

5/10