Review: Hansen's Natural Cherry Vanilla Creme Soda
Jun 10th, 2009 by George
Guest reviewer and natural beverage enthusiast George Tsakiridis returns with another review. He previously reviewed Zola Immunity Smoothie. We hope you enjoy his thoughts!
When you think of natural sodas, Hansen's is one of the first names that comes to mind. In this review I will be looking at Hansen's Natural Cherry Vanilla Creme Soda, one of the flavors in their cane sugar soda lineup.
We've previously looked at Hansen's Natural Creamy Root Beer Soda and Hansen's Natural Mandarin Lime Soda, and frankly, based on the positive experiences we had with those natural sodas, we were looking forward to the Cherry Vanilla Crème flavor.
It's hard to miss the emphasis on cane sugar, which appears in a bright yellow star near the top of the can, and honestly, they are justified in touting it there. This flavor blew me away with an incredibly clean taste. I am not one to gush over the taste of soda pop, but this flavor really made my day.
Opening the can, one smells a clean cherry aroma that is plain awesome. The look of the drink is crystal clear, like what you might expect out of a lemon-lime drink, showing that there are no unnecessary artificial colors added.
It really mirrored other "healthy" black cherry sodas I have tasted in this appearance and smell. The catch is, this is not just another black cherry drink, which becomes evident in the taste. Once I tasted it, I was met with a great balance of crème and vanilla along with the cherry. The aftertaste is amazing, with both cherry and crème evident – understated, but very good with a clean finish.
Moving to the nuts and bolts of the drink, it contains no high fructose corn syrup because it is cane sugar sweetened, and it shows. Each can contains only 160 calories, and is definitely worth it for so tasty a treat.
A full ingredient list is as follows:
Hansen's Natural Cherry Vanilla Crème Soda
Pure triple filtered carbonated water, cane sugar, citric acid, natural flavors with extracts of madagascan vanilla and washington cherry
As the label states, there is no caffeine, sodium, or preservatives – all positives. I would buy this again in a heartbeat. I am normally not this excited about a drink, but can't say enough about this one. Anyone who is a fan of both crème and cherry sodas has just hit the jackpot. Hansen's has achieved a major coup in the drink world.
I'm glad to see Hansen is using cane sugar. Back when I drank commercially made soda I had some of their natural drinks that used grape juice for sweetening, and in the immortal words of Bill the Cat, "Ack oop barf." It was one of the reasons I mostly switched to homemade. If I see this, I'll try it.
I'd be interested to know the source of the citric acid. Us corn-allergic folks can be really sensitive to the corn-derived form. Some natural products do, in fact, derive citric acid from (gasp!) citrus fruits, and I'd hope this is one. Any information on this from the company?