Grip & Sip. Slow Your Roll. Extreme Relaxation: A guest column

Here's a guest column by Travis, the man who brought us the mystery sandwich.

This is a food blog, so I’m not going to waste your time ranting about the social and cultural consequences of glamorizing the recreational use of cough syrup. There are plenty of articles that do just that and I couldn’t care less if Lil’ Wayne openly drinks codeine. Provided he never tries to make another rock album, he can do whatever he wants (love you, Weezy).

Drank and Sippin Syrup are two relatively new products marketed as ‘the anti-Red Bull,’ a drink to calm and relax an increasingly stressed-out public. Suffering from a bit of anxiety myself, I was excited to find that 7-Eleven stores started carrying Drank. I bought a can on a particularly hungover Sunday morning a couple of months ago. The cashier warned me not to ‘drive on that stuff,’ but a visit to the parents was in order. My initial thought was that the taste was not unlike a light grape soda mixed with a little potpourri. Surprisingly good, actually.



I finished the can in a few minutes, not really considering the possible effects. By the time I arrived at the ‘rents I was overcome by a buzz similar to that of a waning weed high. I stared at the refrigerator at length before realizing the bottle of water I was looking for was right in front of me. I took a three-hour nap. The can promised 'extreme relaxation,' but I might refer to the effect as 'mild anesthesia.'

I’ve had Drank a few times since then. If you’re feeling stressed or looking for a good night’s sleep, it’s a nice occasional treat. I wouldn’t suggest drinking it every night, however, as one of its main ingredients is the same stuff your brain uses to tell your body when it’s nighttime. Probably don’t want to mess around with that too much.

In the other corner we have Sippin Syrup, a ‘beverage’ created in the same vein as Drank—same color, same philosophy, same inextricable link to cough syrup and southern rap. However, the discrepancy in quality between the two products is evident from the second you uncap the Syrup. I was blown away by the stench of bum wine as a good friend pleaded with me not to drink it. ‘IN THE NAME OF SCIENCE,’ I insisted. The night is a bit of a blur after that.



As I write this, a half-empty bottle sits on the table next to me, topped off with vague memories of headache and restlessness. Sippin Syrup tasted exactly how it smelled and it was only consumable small sips. It was more viscous than Drank. It didn’t make me any calmer and I’m pretty sure I forgot how to work the TV at some point.

I was given fair warning and ignored it. ‘Don’t drink that, it has to be full of arsenic. I want to vomit just thinking about it.’ Don’t repeat my mistake. If you want to experiment with these so-called relaxation beverages, make it Drank. Better yet, crush up a couple Benadryl in a glass of grape soda and achieve the same effect.

Arnold Palmer is delicious

Arnold Palmer makes the perfect non-boozy summertime drink, don't you agree? Sure, I could do without the artificial sweetener after-taste the canned variety leaves in your mouth, but that's not going to stop me from strolling down the street enjoying one, catching glances from people who think I'm drinking a tallboy. Better still, ordering an Arnold Palmer in a restaurant makes you look totally classy.

Speaking of classy, here's a can of Arnold Palmer that I once drank, sitting on top of a toolbox in my friend's front yard.



Fast fact for the unfamiliar: Contrary to pervasive rumors, this drink is no longer derived from Mr. Palmer's golf club palm sweat extract*. Today, it's half iced tea, half lemonade.

*This is a joke.

The 7-11 Mutant Berry Slurpee: A guest post

On Thursday, April 9, 2009 at 10:12 p.m., my friend Mike "tweeted" about wanting to know why 7-11 would create a Slurpee flavor called "Mutant Berry." I suggested that he review it for Nate's Plate and he agreed. I quickly forgot about this until last Friday when he asked for my email address so he could send me his review. I assume he got to sample the frozen treat at work since he photographed it next to a fax machine and he doesn't seem to be the kind of guy who owns a fax machine. What we have here is more of a sneak preview about the consequences of this concoction, which happens to be neon orange -- a color unaffiliated with any berry having regular genetics. Also noteworthy is the fact that he would "never!!!!" drink it again.



Armageddon is upon us. Why in God's name is 7-11 selling a Slurpee flavor titled "Mutant Berry"?? In a world of "EXTREME" beverages at my disposal with contents like Guarana (which NO ONE knows what it is, but I thought it's what you call bat shit), why would someone want to "mutate" a berry? The title of said drink is, in fact, accurate; it is like no flavor known to the natural world. It is a pomegranate / cherry / lime fusion that I can only describe as "the end of the world ... in a cup." 20 ounces of a frosty beverage that would scare Moses himself right out of his sandals. This is not a good sign of things to come ...



Get on down to 7-11 and let me know what you think. -Nate

Point of sale genius marketing: NOH Hawaiian iced tea

Once upon a time, I was invited to a "shrimp and white wine party" with some friends. On the way to the party, we stopped at the store to get a shrimp tray and I noticed something in the checkout aisle: NOH Hawaiian Iced Tea. Their slogan is "Say yes to NOH!" and that's exactly what I did. Its placement combined with the tagline made it ideal for point of sale impulse purchases.


NOH sat on the counter in my kitchen for a month. I knew I was going to write about it, but lately I have had higher priorities than drinking a pouch of iced tea. After crawling exhaustedly into bed to read at around 8:30 last night with no pending review, I knew I'd be consuming NOH this morning.

To me, NOH smells familiar but not like iced tea. It smells like weird oatmeal or something. But maybe I am wrong, since my friend Erika who bought NOH for the exact same reasons as me claims it smells like regular instant iced tea to her. Maybe we're both right and instant iced tea always smells like weird oatmeal regardless of whether or not it came from a volcanic island.

"Weird oatmeal" does not really do this iced tea justice though. Why? NOH is damn good, and probably refreshing too. I didn't even have to add sugar, since cane sugar is already in the mix. The package says you can even alter how much water you use "for personal taste" -- how intimate.

There's nothing remarkable about the flavor (as in "a slight hint of volcanic ash is what really makes it") but it's remarkable that I want to drink a gallon of this stuff on a frigid March morning. The variety I bought is lemon flavored, so it tastes fairly close to an Arnold Palmer Iced Tea, one of my summer staples, which is probably why I am saying "yes" to NOH.

And in case you are curious, I have no idea what NOH stands for.

Dewmocracy now! Mountain Dew Revolution

A coworker approached my desk. "Nate, you'll be able to answer this question," he said. "What is that blue Mountain Dew in the vending machine?"

"!!!" I replied.

He asked if it was Baja Blast, which I had recently told him about. I replied that it was probably the end result of Mountain Dew's Dewmocracy campaign. My research indicates that Revolution (the beverage in question) was in the running, but Voltage was the real crowd pleaser. Though I have not had the pleasure of consuming Voltage yet, I could see why the Revolution was pacified.

I inserted my dollar into the vending machine, entered the coordinates of the beverage and it was dispensed to me.

I first noticed that the liquid was a blue-gray. Sort of like mop water poured into the bowl of a toilet with one of those blue dissolving bricks floating in the tank. I examined the bottle for a hint of what to expect and then I cracked the seal.

A smell identical to that of Baja Blast wafted out. It was fruity, yet musty, like the basement at Knott's Berry Farm. I was getting excited. Colleagues were stopping by my desk, asking me what the hell I was drinking.

A first sip revealed a flavor that was a cross between Baja Blast (the apple doesn't fall far from the tree in the Mountain Dew family) and something at the more unique end of the Arizona brand beverage spectrum. Swishing it around my mouth, I observed a nice tingle, and a slight bitterness at the lower sides of my tongue.

Revolution's flavor is absolutely restrained. It does not live up to its potential. It builds, nearing its peak, and abruptly stops. What causes such a thing? Too much water?

The bottle claims this beverage is "Dew® Drinker Designed." There is no hyphen, confounding the rules of compound modifiers. The real Dew-Drinker is probably not familiar with ginseng, so I am not so sure it was truly designed by the consumer. The Dew-Drinkers know this. I know this, and I don't really even drink soda (with Baja Blast being an exception as an accompaniment to Volcano Tacos).

I am proud to say that the caffeine-addled constituents of the Dewmocracy campaign have voted out the correct candidate. The way the flavor fails to build is really bumming me out.

Learn about the rest of this exciting day next time with my review of the TACO SUB.