A shout out of thanks to HOTLIPS for sending us a bevy of carbonated fruit juice beverages. We put them to the test and here are the results…
Read my lips – if you like soda or carbonated fruit drinks, you’ll love HOTLIPS’ lineup of natural fruit sodas, they’re nicely bubbly and berry-licious.
Why do we love them? Aside from HOTLIPS’ rich fruit flavor and light sparkling quality, this Oregon-based family-run business sources their fruit from locally available fruit farms in the Pacific Northwest, and they tap into a locally available recycled glass for their bottling.
With an already established Portland-based HotLips pizza restaurant business, these apparent locavores decided to branch out and create fruit-based soda pop. The current lineup includes: pear, cherry, apple, raspberry, black raspberry, boysenberry, strawberry and blackberry.
We tried all except apple and strawberry. They were quite refreshing — not too sweet, bubbly or overpowering. Our faves were raspberry, pear and boysenberry.
Each bottle contains: carbonated water, cane sugar and organic lemon juice in addition to the fruit on the label of each bottle. Because there’s real fruit in each bottle, there’s also real pulp, which adds to the real fruit tasting experience. Calories range from a low of 80 for Cherry to a high of 150 for Blackberry.
Want to try? Pop on over to hotlipssoda.com or follow on Twitter @ hotlipssoda
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Too bad they’re not diet. When you think of soda you think of a low cal drink but these have sugar in them.
When I think of soda I think of high-calorie drinks. If someone’s concerned about calories, this drink is probably the least of their worries. Compared to the ingredients in either a regular or low-cal mainstream soda, I’d still reach for a carbonated fruit-based drink like HotLips even though it contains sugar.