Perrier Energize Caffeine & Yerba Mate Grapefruit Flavour Caffeinated Energy Drink

 

An energy drink for the discerning palate..?

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Energy drinks on on sale off the street downtown. I watched neon signs glow in the dark near the drink cooler. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.

I have taken up living at the homeless camp again.

The camp is probably a fairly close approximation of what our prehistoric societies must have looked like: a band of desperate people barely scraping out an existence, a loose coalition led by the largest and most fearsome among us, and in my case, that is a large man of Haitian extraction that is known by the mononym "Blaster" to the other camp-dwellers.

Our lives in this prehistoric state are as nasty, brutish, and short as Hobbes thought they would be. While survival is our primary goal, Blaster is ambitious and ruthless and tries to drag us out of our rut. We truly are hunter-gatherers, and I have become one of the hunters, but the quarry that Blaster chooses for us is neither mammoth nor aurochs, it is people, and more specifically the wealthy.

My hands are literally and figuratively bloodstained. I have taken dozens of lives and feel no sort of remorse, I am little more than an animal, guided by fear and instinct. While we are barbaric, we are not wasteful - we use every aspect of the people that we kill. Even now the rotund rump of some retiree roasts on a spit above a garbage-can fire, children are swaddled in the leathery skins of a spray-tanned yuppy. As for me, one of the hunters, I had my choice of spoils, and I chose the energy drinks that we plundered from the pantries and refrigerators of those that we killed.

I drank deeply and quickly, and I regret it. They say beggars can't be choosers, and while that is fairly close to describing my lot in life, I would choose to not drink this again. Maybe my tastes have been corrupted by my utter lack of humanity, but I can barely tolerate this so-called high-class energy drink pictured above.

I don't know what I expected out of Perrier, but this "organic" energy drink featuring "organic yerba mate" is just not quite what I want when I want an energy drink. The taste is subtle, and while it promises the taste of grapefruit (and tangerine, another flavour I tried) it does not really deliver. Maybe it is the yerba mate or maybe it is the entire subtle-angle the drink is trying to push, but it tastes the way wet leaves smell.

Fizzy, wet leaf tea - is this what the wealthy really like?

I have spoken with the raving, blind, elderly woman who serves as shaman to our tribe of homeless murderers, and she says that she cannot see a future where I drink this beverage again; at least that is a small solace in my meaningless and savage existence.

I must go now, I have to join Blaster and the other hunters in a ritual orgy before we go on another hunt, this day I shall take life again.     

Information and review:

• Location Purchased: Fancy Upscale Grocery
• Price when Purchased: $1.99 Leafbacks 

Taste: There is almost no indication of the grapefruit (or tangerine in that variant) and a "herbal" taste; there is almost no sweetness. I would categorize it as almost tea-like, and is very different than a typical energy drink and, in my opinion, not especially nice.  

Energy: While the flavour is lacking, this delivers in energy. The yerba mate provides 120mg of caffeine in 330ml serving, making it stronger than Red Bull and just below Monster and Rockstar (XD Thermo line) by caffeine/ml. There is also some sugar in it, but one can only has 35 calories. 

Bottom Line: I guess if you like fancy, subtle flavours for your energy drink tasting parties, maybe this is a good choice. It has an introductory sale-price, so maybe that also helps, but kind of goes against the high-brow Perrier image, maybe an energy drink for poseurs? I won't be getting it again, that much is clear. 

💧

2/5 - decent energy, but what cost? 

You might have a different opinion or experience - feel free to let me know in the comments.