Product Review: Bundaberg Blood Orange Soda

I got this for me and bought Leann a guava-flavored soda, also by Bundaberg. Owing to a bad experience with guava fruit while I was serving an LDS mission in Monterrey, México [1], I don't like guava fruit. One of my first days in the country we ate lunch with an LDS family. They gave us agua de guayaba ("guava fruit juice") to drink. I thought it tasted a little weird—particularly the aftertaste—but I didn't mind it. But then, like happens with cucumbers [2], I was burping it up all day. Tasting it for half an hour at lunch was one thing. Tasting it all day was quite another. I've detested guava fruit from that day forth. So I won't be reviewing Leann's soda—I didn't even try it.

My verdict: This soda was a little heavy on the carbonation, but a few days open in the fridge toned it down. I really don't get the hype over blood oranges. The only difference that I can tell is that they're a darker orange than navel oranges. This soda tasted no different to me than Orange Fanta or Orange Crush—but I'm sure both of those are cheaper.

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Notes:

[1] For those who are unsure why Latter-day Saints (Mormons) go on missions, I recommend you visit here and here, where you can learn more about LDS beliefs concerning sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ. If you have more questions, ask and maybe I'll do a full post on the topic.

[2] Chemicals called cucurbitacins (see general structure above) are responsible both for bitter flavor in cucumbers and for burping. There are burpless varieties of cucumber which are supposed to lack these cucurbitacins.

Image attributions:

Cucurbitacin General Structure is by NEUROtiker, available at http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cucurbitane Grundstruktur num.svg.