While perusing the shelves for rare energy drinks, I spotted a can that reminded me of Del Monte Bloom Energy (which was pretty tasty.) This time the drink was VidaTea Ultra Premium Sparkling Tea.

I love tea, I like sparkling juice, and obviously I can’t resist anything that is “ultra premium,” but I’ve never actually liked anything that was a sparkling tea.

I got some anyway, choosing the desert pear green tea flavor. (Pomegranate, Mango, and Blueberry were also available, but desert pear was something I’ve never had.)

Actually, I don’t even know what desert pear is! A cactus? I’m betting the flavor comes from a “prickly pear cactus” or something like that, which happens to grow in the desert. Hence desert pear. But the website only mentions “pear flavor” without acknowledging the “desert” part, so who knows?

Anyway… the ingredients were somewhat interesting. It uses organic blue agave nectar as the sweetener, which is really what drew me in.

Unfortunately, as natural as the agave nectar sounds, it usually comes in the form of agave syrup. And yes, there is processing involved in its production, leading to the debate about agave nectar being as bad as HFCS.

(Basically, agave nectar is junk, but I still wanted to try it just this once.)

Even worse, this VidaTea contains crystalline fructose, which reminds me of high fructose corn syrup.

The saving grace for health-conscious consumers is the antioxidant content. It contains Grape Seed Extract, Alpha Lipoic Acid, Coenzyme Q10, and EGCG. But as with most of these drinks with antioxidants added in, I have to ask, “is the dose really enough to make a difference in my health?”

Most likely, it’s just enough benefit to offset the negative health affects from the sub-par ingredients like processed sweeteners and preservatives.

The Taste Test

All it took was one sip for me to decide I wasn’t going to like this stuff. I had a few more sips, but there was just nothing about it I liked.

It reminded me of beer in a way. It tastes like the carbonation of beer, which is distinctly different from a carbonated soda. (Steaz green tea soda was like a soda, while this stuff reminds me of beer.)

I think if you brewed beer containing cacti, it would taste like this.

Moving on… where’s the green tea flavor? After a few sips, I just barely noticed the green tea. It takes a distant backseat to the carbonation and weird taste.

I’d say this is more of a drink for sparkling water fanatics. Green tea drinkers like myself would be better off skipping this beverage in favor of something that tastes like tea.

But I guess some people do like it, considering it was named “Best Tea” in the Green Tea Sweetened category by the World Tea Expo.

I just don’t get the idea of sparkling green tea, apparently.

My final verdict is…

I took a gamble when I bought this because I didn’t really want sparkling tea, but since it was sweetened with agave, I figured I wanted to try it out of curiosity.

Well, I rolled the dice and lost, big time. I hated this drink and couldn’t even finish the can. This is the last “sparkling green tea” I’m buying!

Official website: www.VidaTea.com

From the Jones Soda Company comes… tea! Jones Organics are ready-to-drink teas are organic, come in nice 14oz bottles, and you know what, they’re pretty good!

They do lack the obscure flavors of Jones Soda (such as green apple and fufu berry,) but they also lack the high fructose corn syrup, so it’s a fair trade.

These Jones teas are a little higher in sugar than Honest Tea, but there is way less sugar than Steaz green tea soda. This gives them a good, natural tea taste that’s just a little on the sweet side.

To give you an idea of the ingredients, here is the short list from the label…

White Tea – Cherry Ingredients: Water, Organic Cane Sugar, Natural Flavors, White Tea Solids Brewed From Tea Leaves, Citric Acid, Ascorbic Acid.

All the calories come from the cane sugar. With 15g sugar per serving, you get 60 calories per serving, for 105 total calories per bottle.

And of course, a few more details on the taste…

Jones Organics Taste Test

For this test, I tried two white teas and a red tea.

White Tea – Cherry – This starts off with a very powerful, authentic white tea flavor. Then there is a very strong and sweet cherry flavor on top of that.

The cherry is so sweet that it makes the bold white tea kind of bitter, but I really like how you’re tasting the true ingredients. It really does taste natural.

I wouldn’t mind if it was a little less sweet, but overall, it does have a good natural taste that I’d love to drink again.

White Tea – Strawberry – This tea has a pleasant taste that’s definitely not as strong as the cherry. The white tea was less pronounced, and the strawberry flavor was much more mild than the cherry.

It reminded me more of a home-brewed white tea with strawberry flavor than a ready-to-drink tea, but that made for a very easy-to-drink beverage. I went through the 14oz bottle in no time. Normally I really like strawberry white tea, but in this case, I think I’d choose the white tea cherry over this.

Red Tea – Tropical – I’m really not a big fan of red tea, but I tried this anyway… and it made for a good combo!

The red tea has a stronger flavor than white or green tea, but it’s not quite like black tea. That robust flavor means it goes great with the lighter, fruity flavor they call “tropical” (I’m thinking pineapple, mango, and something else.)

So I was kind of surprised how good this was! Certainly an interesting choice if you’re used to white and green teas!

Other flavors I haven’t tried include: Red Tea – Peach, Green Tea – Mandarin, and Green Tea – Berry.

My final verdict is…

Health-wise, this is pretty decent for a ready-to-drink tea, especially from a soda company. If you are weening yourself off soda, this tea could help you switch to healthier drinks.

But if you’re already brewing your own tea or drinking Honest Tea, Jones Organics might be a tad too sweet. Stick with your regular tea unless you need something sweet on a special occasion.

Official website: www.JonesOrganics.com

I like to keep an eye on all the crazy new energy drinks because sometimes you find something healthy. Today that something was a small can of green tea straight from Japan.

This is the Sencha Shot from Ito En, a premiere tea brewer in Japan. If the name didn’t give it away, the rock solid, steel can sure would have. This is not the can to try smashing on your forehead!

It actually reminded me of the Starbucks Double Shot Espresso can, which clues you in to the taste. In a word, it’s strong! This is the tea version of an espresso – strong, bitter, and a definite wake-up call! I guess that’s how they take it in Japan.

I wasn’t expecting something that was all-natural, unsweetened, and had 0 calories to be tasty, but I was still surprised at how “full-bodied” the flavor was. Some people call it “full-bodied” or “authentic,” but I have a more descriptive opinion…

I think it tastes like crap. Figuratively speaking, that is. Literally, it tastes (and smells) more like vomit. I couldn’t drink the whole thing (even though the can is only 6.4 ounces.) The terrible smell rising from the can sets the stage for a bitter green tea, which actually isn’t so bad once you’re drinking it.

Like I said, I couldn’t finish the can, so I let it sit overnight in the fridge. Then the horrid smell was gone the next morning. I was able to taste this “authentic Japanese green tea” which was interesting, but still on the bitter side. The taste actually seemed like I was chewing on raw tea leaves and branches out in the wilderness (except that I was sipping it from a can in the comfort of my living room.)

Moving on to the health benefits…

The highlight of this tea is that it contains 152 milligrams of catechin tea antioxidants. Epicatechin, epicatechingallate, epigallocatechin, and epigallocatechingallate, to be specific.

Surely the high concentration of antioxidants plus a day’s worth of Vitamin C is worth the bitter taste!

My final verdict is…

If you like to try exotic or just plain weird drinks, this could be for you. It could also be used as an espresso replacement for someone looking for a pick-me-up with more antioxidants.

If you like green tea as we drink it in America, though, steer clear of this.

Official site: www.itoen.com/sencha/

Buy it: Amazon.com

I almost bought these for Christmas gifts last year… for my enemies!

* It got a 4-star rating at Amazon.com, so some people must like this stuff.

[Click here if you would like to get your product reviewed on CoachLevi.com.]

What a load of BS. One of my friends told me that the reason English people have bad teeth is because they drink a lot of tea. I’ve never been to England, so I had no idea that they supposedly have bad teeth… But that rumor doesn’t really matter, because tea is definitely NOT bad for your teeth.

I’ll keep drinking a few glasses of tea every day to improve my health. My teeth are perfectly fine, and I don’t see why I should give up tea, which has so many other health benefits I can’t even begin to list them all.

I found a really old study saying that herbal tea can hurt teeth, but I’m not falling for it. In the rest of my research, I have only found sites that say how good tea is. This story looks trustworthy, this green tea info looks good too, and most other stories were totally useless.

So from now on, keep drinking your tea in peace and ignore people who don’t know what they are talking about

Photo credit: prakhar

I’ve always been a tea drinker, but now I’m really into it. It started last winter when I got into the habit of drinking 2-3 glasses of white tea per day. Granted that was at home where I had a full kitchen, but even at college I can fit a glass or two of tea into my schedule.

Active.com has a great article about tea, which everyone should read:

http://www.active.com/story.cfm?story_id=12683

That’s good, but Matt Furey is who really turned me on to tea. He talks about green and white tea straight from China – the good stuff! But you don’t have to go to China to get tea. If you live in or near a bigger city, you should find plenty of green and white tea in one of the supermarkets. If not, you can always order it online.

But the point is, whatever tea you can get, drink some! (And don’t worry, tea is not bad for your teeth.)