Northern Soda Company Pineapple Cream Soda

I opened this at work earlier today:

 
Brand: Northern Soda Company Pineapple Cream Soda

Origin: Arden Hills, MN.

Purchase Place: "Grandpa Joe's Candy Shop," Spring Lake Park, MN.

Sweetener: Cane Sugar.

Review: Well, the name of this soda is right on: it's truly a "pineapple cream" soda! The first sip of it touching my tongue was very "pineapple-y," and I'm honestly not a HUGE fan of pineapple. This soda didn't bother me though. And then the "creaminess" came as it was a SMOOTH pineapple flavor. It ended with a great smoothness like a nice cream soda. This was surprising to me... this was better than I thought it was going to be! I wish I had this at home as my boys would have loved to have tried a sip of this. I was ready for this to be a 4 or a 5, but in the end, I'll rank it a bit better than average:

Score: 7 out of 10.

Spongebob Squarepants Bikini Bottom Cooler Pineapple Drink

I opened this with my boys earlier this week:

Brand: Spongebob Squarepants Bikini Bottom Cooler Pineapple Drink

Origin: Woburn, MA.

Purchase Place: Grandpa Joe's Candy Shop, Spring Lake Park, MN.

Sweetener: Sucralose.

Review: This was decent, especially for being only 5 calories. One of my boys remarked that it was a little like Mountain Dew, and I could see that - it had the citrus hit of Mountain Dew, but then with more of a pineapple flavored kick at the end. It wasn't overly sweet, which was a concern being it's based off a cartoon. Decent, but not amazing.

Score: 6 out of 10.

Soda-Flavored Jelly

Blue Sun Soda has "Soda-Pop Jelly," and root beer sounds horrible. But I'd also love to try it.

North Star Pineapple Orange Soda

I brought this to class with me today:

With a board full of notes in the background. Busy day.

Brand: North Star Pineapple Orange Soda.

Origin: Forest Lake, MN.

Purchase Place: Blue Sun Soda, Spring Lake Park, MN.

Sweetener: Sugar.

Review: OK, "pineapple orange" doesn't sound that good to me. I mean, let's be honest. But I just thought I'd give this a try. The flavor is subtle and "soft," and it was surprisingly good. The pineapple isn't harsh or too sharp, and it tastes like a true mix of pineapple and orange. Sure, I had low expectations for this, but it flew past them. Not too shabby.

Score: 6.5 out of 10.

Always Ask for Avery's Kitty Piddle

Still on vacation! I brought these 2 "fun" sodas to share with my 5 and 7-year-old niece and nephew:

In our cabin on Lake Mary.

The first one we tried was the "Kitty Piddle," so this review will be about that.

At the supper table with my Dad in the background.

Brand: Always Ask for Avery's Kitty Piddle.

Origin: New Britain, Connecticut.

Purchase Place: "Minnesota's Largest Candy Store," Jordan, MN.

Sweetener: Pure Cane Sugar.

Review: This was pretty refreshing. It tastes like the flavor on the label: pineapple orange. It was pretty sweet and had a nice amount of carbonation. It's nothing fancy, but it was refreshing (with grilled brats for supper at the cabin). I'll give it a middle-of-the-road average score.

Score: 5 out of 10.

Pineapple Faygo

My wife got this from my parents a few months ago (she loves Diet Grape Faygo, so my parents got her a lot of that along with this random bottle), and it's just been sitting in our fridge. I got the OK to crack into it and try it.

Brand: Pineapple Faygo.

Origin: Detroit, MI.

Purchase Place: Some Kwik Trip in southern MN (maybe Mankato?).

Sweetener: High Fructose Corn Syrup.

Review: I'm not a fan of pineapples. Surprisingly, I'm also not a fan of pineapple-flavored things. Wait, maybe that's not that surprising. So I didn't expect much here. BUT I LIKED IT. I expected it to be sharp, but it was quite sweet and smooth. It had Faygo's typical over-sweetness, but I'm OK with overly sweet.

Score: 6.5 out of 10.

Joia Pineapple Coconut & Nutmeg Soda

I had my first Joia soda nearly 2 years ago - I don't remember what flavor it was, but I remembered it being a little "weird," and I didn't care for it a lot. But I recently picked up 2 more Joias to try out.

Blurry photo from a big taco party we were at this past weekend.

A better photo from the Joia website.

Admission: I do not care for pineapple or coconut that much.  So I didn't know what I was hoping with this soda.

Brand: Joia Pineapple Coconut & Nutmeg Soda.

Origin: Minneapolis, MN.

Purchase Place: Lunds Grocery Store, St. Paul, MN.

Sweetener: Cane Sugar.

Review: This wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be. In fact, it was downright tasty. I didn't taste much of the nutmeg: it was mainly coconut flavor with a bit of pineapple in there. It was very sweet and went down well. It's flavor sounded like it could have been "sharp," "harsh," and just not very drinkable, but it was quite tasty. It was good with my tacos at our taco party.

Score: 7.5 out of 10.