QUICK REVIEW: Blue Diamond Almond Breeze Iced Coffee (Vanilla and Mocha)

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Blue Diamond Almond Breeze Iced Coffee (Vanilla and Mocha)

Purchased Price: $4.99 each
Size: Half gallon
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 6 out of 10
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Creamy and easy to drink. Not overly sweet like other cartoned iced coffee…I’m looking at you International Delight! Vanilla version tastes marshmallowy. Good source of vitamin E. Contains caffeine. 100 calories per serving. Dairy, soy, and gluten free. Made with non-GMO almonds.
Cons: The coffee flavor barely registers on my tongue, even though they have a strong coffee aroma. Mocha version tastes too much like chocolate almond milk. The carton (and Blue Diamond’s website) doesn’t say how much caffeine a serving has, so let’s make up a number until we get the real number…let’s say 6832 milligrams of caffeine. Could use more calcium and vitamin D.

Blue Diamond Almond Breeze Iced Coffee Mocha

Nutrition Facts: (1 cup) Mocha – 100 calories, 20 calories from fat, 2 grams of fat, 0 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0.5 grams of polyunsaturated fat, 1 gram of monounsaturated fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 120 milligrams of sodium, 125 milligrams of potassium, 19 grams of carbohydrates, 1 grams of fiber, 17 grams of sugar, 1 grams of protein, and a bunch of vitamins and minerals. Vanilla – 100 calories, 20 calories from fat, 2 grams of fat, 0 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 grams of polyunsaturated fat, 1 gram of monounsaturated fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 115 milligrams of sodium, 85 milligrams of potassium, 19 grams of carbohydrates, 1 grams of fiber, 17 grams of sugar, 1 grams of protein, and a bunch of vitamins and minerals.

QUICK REVIEW: Seattle’s Best Coffee Mega Mocha Frozen Coffee Blends

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Seattle's Best Coffee Mega Mocha Frozen Coffee Blends

Purchased Price: $3.29
Size: 16 oz. (prepared)
Purchased at: Target
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Tastes like a chocolate milkshake. A wonderful sweet treat. Easy to make, if you have an awesome blender. Made with 100% Arabica coffee beans (too bad I can’t really taste them). Makes two 8-ounce servings (if you wish to share) or one 16-ounce serving (if you have no one to share it with). Frozen bits taste good by themselves without being blended.
Cons: Tastes like a chocolate milkshake; coffee flavor is hardly noticeable. Coffee is listed tenth on ingredients list. If you have a cheap blender, these might be difficult to blend. Right, cheap Oster blender in my kitchen. BYOWTD (Bring Your Own Whipped Topping and Drizzle).

Nutrition Facts: (as packaged/no milk) 100 calories, 4 grams of fat, 2.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 15 milligrams of cholesterol, 15 milligrams of sodium, 14 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of fiber, 9 grams of sugar, and 0 grams of protein.

REVIEW: Starbucks Discoveries (Caffe Mocha, Caramel Macchiato & Vanilla Latte)

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Starbucks Discoveries

I don’t go to Starbucks very often. When I do, it’s usually to buy a gift card, use their restroom, or jump on their free WiFi network and be a complete douchebag by trying to slow down everyones’ bandwidth. But when it comes to coffee, Starbucks has given me a few good reasons to not purchase any from one of their bazillion locations.

No, it’s not the taste of their coffee, which coffee snobs describe as, and I’m paraphrasing here, “blech.” No, it’s not the long lines that sometimes snake half way around a Starbucks. The reason why I don’t buy Starbucks coffee from one of their many locations is because I nervously mumble when trying to relay my order to a cute barista and I can buy ready-to-drink Starbucks coffee at my local supermarket, like their bottled iced coffee and new Starbucks Discoveries.

Starbucks Discoveries is a chilled espresso beverage that comes in three flavors — Caffe Mocha, Vanilla Latte, and Caramel Macchiato — and 50.7-ounce cartons, which is significantly smaller than the 64-ounce International Delight Iced Coffee it’s probably sitting next to in the dairy case. Also, unlike the International Delight offering, the carton doesn’t look like a milk carton. Instead, it looks like it was made by an origami master who reached that level by folding a million paper cranes.

Starbucks Discoveries are sweetened with sugar and mixed with reduced-fat milk. They’re sweet, but don’t come close to the sweetness level of International Delight’s iced coffee, which, not surprisingly, has significantly more sugar than Starbucks Discoveries (17 grams vs. 23 grams). Starbucks Discoveries are also noticeably watery, but that’s because they don’t contain the thickening agents found in the International Delight coffee — gellan gum and carrageenan. Well, actually, the Caffe Mocha has carrageenan, but it’s as watery as the others.

Starbucks Discoveries Chilled

If you do pick up a carton of Starbucks Discoveries, I highly recommend you ONLY drink it over ice. Ignore what the side of the carton says about serving it just chilled. Drinking it that way is doing a disservice to your taste buds. I can’t explain why, but for some strange reason, it tastes noticeably better when consumed over ice.

If you’re a hardcore Starbucks fanatic who will never lose your Gold Card because you accumulate 30 stars every two weeks, you may drink Starbucks Discoveries and wonder what is this swill. It’s not as sweet as a hand-crafted Frappuccino, but its coffee flavor isn’t as strong as any iced coffee Starbucks product on their menu.

Starbucks Discoveries Closeup

The Mocha Latte tastes like weak melted chocolate ice cream with a Hershey’s syrup aftertaste, the Caramel Macchiato has a slightly odd caramel butteriness that lingers several minutes after drinking it, and the Vanilla Latte has a hint of vanilla and the strongest coffee flavor of the bunch. If I had to pick a favorite, it would be the Vanilla Latte because I didn’t use a negative adjective when writing about it in the previous sentence.

All three flavors of Starbucks Discoveries were decent and provided approximately 85 milligrams of caffeine per cup, but I’m a bit disappointed because I expected something better from Starbucks. After all, they do sell a krazillion cups of coffee everyday from their bazillion locations.

(Nutrition Facts – 8 fl oz – Caffe Mocha – 120 calories, 20 calories from fat, 2 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 10 milligrams of cholesterol, 50 milligrams of sodium, 20 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of fiber, 17 grams of sugar, 3 grams of protein, 4% vitamin A, 10% calcium and 2% iron. Caramel Macchiato & Vanilla Latte – 120 calories, 20 calories from fat, 2 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 10 milligrams of cholesterol, 40 milligrams of sodium, 20 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of fiber, 17 grams of sugar, 3 grams of protein, 4% vitamin A, and 10% calcium.)

Other Starbucks Discoveries reviews:
Starbucks Melody

Item: Starbucks Discoveries (Caffe Mocha, Caramel Macchiato & Vanilla Latte)
Purchased Price: $5.49 (on sale)
Size: 50.7 fl oz carton
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 6 out of 10 (Caffe Mocha)
Rating: 6 out of 10 (Caramel Macchiato)
Rating: 7 out of 10 (Vanilla Latte)
Pros: Flavors were decent. Less sugar than International Delight’s regular iced coffee. Kind of a neat looking carton. A cup contains approximately 85 milligrams of caffeine. Starbucks’ free WiFi.
Cons: I expected something better from Starbucks. Hardcore Starbucks drinkers may consider this product to be swill. Comes in a smaller carton than competing iced coffees. Being too lazy to add the accent mark above the e in Caffe.

REVIEW: Dunkin’ Donuts Old Fashioned Butter Pecan Iced Coffee

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Dunkin' Donuts Old Fashioned Butter Pecan Iced Coffee

Maybe it’s just me, but I’ve always struggled with walking into Dunkin’ Donuts. It’s not that I’m drunk and end up stumbling into glass doors or anything like that, but rather, it’s the unfortunate predisposition I have to being both very, very indecisive, as well as having insatiable cravings for the kinds of things that keep dentists working overtime.

Never mind the fact that Dunkin’ Donuts presents me with a sugary catalogue filled with fried dough in all shapes and sizes, but I oftentimes find myself in a Dunkin’ that shares their space with the 31 flavors of Baskin-Robbins.

What starts out as a late afternoon coffee pick-me-up can easily turn into three scoops of Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough, followed by the inevitable and actual physical struggle of walking out of Dunkin’ Donuts thanks to a sugar high not seen since that fat kid in Matilda ate that whole chocolate cake.

The way I see it, the new Baskin-Robbins-inspired iced coffee flavors from Dunkin’ are, or at least should be, the ideal way to kill two birds with one stone and get both my coffee kick and ice cream sugar fix (as for working donut ingestion into that mix, I leave that up to Baskin-Robbins’ R&D).

Since I recently returned from a business trip in which I experienced the full brunt of that sweet southern concoction of nuts, butter, cream, and sugar known as pralines, I felt like the Old Fashioned Butter Pecan Iced Coffee was calling my name. And because I stress the utmost in scientific and accurate reporting on all things tooth decaying and artery clogging, I made sure to grab a cone of Baskin-Robbins’ Old Fashioned Butter Pecan Ice Cream at the same time.

Dunkin' Donuts Old Fashioned Butter Pecan Iced Coffee with Ice Cream

The Old Fashioned Butter Pecan Iced Coffee didn’t taste exactly like the ice cream flavor that shares its name, but the former is still very good. Because I wish for my iced coffee to have the rich taste of actual milk fat and not just the watery and dull taste of lactic acid, I chose to have my iced coffee with cream instead of skim milk. I highly suggest this.

The syrup itself is plenty sweet, but not cloying in the way you’d expect from the stuff that gives snow cones their flavor. It’s actually remarkably balanced when taken with the rest of the beverage, with a roasted pecan flavor that’s only heightened by the mellow and smooth Dunkin’ coffee. There’s also a depth of sweetness that tastes like brown sugar or maple syrup.

Dunkin' Donuts Old Fashioned Butter Pecan Iced Coffee Topsies

Taking turns sipping from my iced coffee and licking my Butter Pecan Ice Cream cone, I found both products enjoyable, if moderately different in flavor. The iced coffee focused the pecan flavor more in terms of what I would call a “creamery fresh” sensation with a sophisticated roasted vibe, while the ice cream drew most of its flavor from the buttery and oily flavors of the big ass pecan sticking out of the cone.

Dunkin' Donuts Old Fashioned Butter Pecan Iced Coffee Dunking

I didn’t find Dunkin’ Donuts’ take on sister chain Baskin-Robbins’ Old Fashioned Butter Pecan Ice Cream to be an exact replication, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a bold and interesting new take in the overcrowded fast food iced coffee market which screams for flavors beyond vanilla, hazelnut, and caramel. The roasted and full-flavored coffee notes, as well as the brown sugar, give the Old Fashioned Butter Pecan Iced Coffee a kind of pralines and cream flavor that’s in some ways preferable to the “Old Fashioned” Butter Pecan flavor of the Baskin-Robbins ice cream, and much more lively than the par-for-the-course shot of vanilla-flavored syrup.

(Nutrition Facts – small – 140 calories, 50 calories from fat, 6 grams of fat, 3.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 20 milligrams of cholesterol, 115 milligrams of sodium, 21 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of fiber, 17 grams of sugar, 2 grams of protein, and 6% calcium.)

Item: Dunkin’ Donuts Old Fashioned Butter Pecan Iced Coffee
Purchased Price: $1.69
Size: Small
Purchased at: Dunkin’ Donuts
Rating: 8 out of 10
Pros: Much better than standard iced coffee syrup. Tastes like butter pecan. Creamery fresh taste has roasted pecan flavor thanks to the smoky notes of coffee. Pralines ‘n Cream thing going on. Killing two birds with one stone. Dunking ice cream in coffee gives new meaning to the ‘Dunkin’ in Dunkin Donuts.
Cons: Doesn’t have actual pecans in it. Butter flavor could use some work. Finding a way to work donuts into the equation

REVIEW: International Delight Vanilla Iced Coffee Light

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International Delight Vanilla Iced Coffee Light

International Delight’s Iced Coffee regularly finds its way into my cart because last year it found its way into my heart after I gave it a positive review.

But every so often, when I place a half gallon carton in my cart, I think to myself, “Suck it, Starbucks!” and “All that cream and sugar is probably making me chubby…All right, chubbier.”

I don’t know if it’s because International Delight has seen me naked, but they now have light versions of their mocha and vanilla iced coffees.

Like the non-light version, International Delight Vanilla Iced Coffee Light is made with 100 percent premium Arabica coffee beans. However, it has 1/3 fewer calories and 39 percent less sugar than their regular iced coffee.

Why does it have fewer calories and sugar?

Magic!!!

Actually, it’s because of the popular artificial sweeteners, sucralose and acesulfame potassium.

So it’s not magic. It’s science!!!

Although International Delight Vanilla Iced Coffee uses artificial sweeteners, it still has the same 2.5 grams of fat and 1.5 grams of saturated fat the original has. It also has 56 milligrams of caffeine per 8-ounce serving, which is two milligrams less than their regular iced coffee.

While pouring International Delight Vanilla Iced Coffee Light into a glass, I noticed it was much thinner than the non-light version, which I think is thick enough that it makes me feel like I’m drinking melted ice cream.

If you’re one of those people who tried the original International Delight Iced Coffee and thought to yourself, “Hey! I’d like a lot more coffee with my cream and sugar!”, then your internal voice will say the same thing about the light version as the combination of coffee, cream, and carrageenan goes down your throat. There’s enough dairy and sweetener to mask the coffee’s bitterness and to almost make a Starbucks Frappuccino blush.

International Delight Vanilla Iced Coffee Light Closeup

However, the difference in flavor between the light and regular versions is similar to the difference between Pepsi and Diet Pepsi (or Coke and Diet Coke for you Pepsi haters or RC Cola and Diet RC Cola for you people fortunate to have RC Cola on your store shelves); you instantly know you’re drinking the light version. The artificial sweeteners were noticeable once the coffee hit my tongue and right through to the aftertaste. Unlike the coffee’s bitterness, no amount of dairy could cover that. As for the vanilla flavor, it was mild, but made the coffee taste marshmallow-ish.

As a regular International Delight Iced Coffee drinker, it’s nice to have a lighter version. Even though the artificial sweeteners created a significant difference in flavor, as a regular diet soda drinker, I didn’t mind it. So it looks like I’ll be putting International Delight Iced Coffee Light into my cart, instead of the regular stuff, and only thinking to myself, “Suck it, Starbucks!”

(Nutrition Facts – 8 ounces – 100 calories, 25 calories from fat, 2.5 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 10 milligrams of cholesterol, 105 milligrams of sodium, 16 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of fiber, 14 grams of sugar, 4 grams of protein, 10% calcium, and 4% iron.)

Item: International Delight Vanilla Iced Coffee Light
Purchased Price: $3.99 (on sale)
Size: Half gallon
Purchased at: Target
Rating: 8 out of 10
Pros: Still creamy and sweet enough to cover the coffee’s bitterness. Vanilla has a marshmallow-ish-ness to it. Fewer calories and less sugar than regular International Delight Iced Coffee. Contains 56 milligrams of sweet, sweet caffeine.
Cons: Artificial sweeteners were noticeable. Thinner than the regular stuff. Trying to spell carrageenan. Using marshmallow-ish-ness. Coffee snobs will turn their noses up at this. Me being naked.

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