Snack Review: POM Wonderful Juice

Despite POM’s multitude of health claims, I’ve never been as excited about their juice as I have been about their packaging. For instance, they used to sell POM in tall glass bottles at my university’s cafe, which thrilled me to no end. Sure, you paid more for your POM than you did for your lunch, but you got a free glass with your purchase! I loved imagining what I could do with my new glass after I’d finished my overpriced juice. I could fill it with water! Or milk! Or sea monkeys! My God - the possibilities were endless.

Nowadays, POM uses plastic containers rather than glass ones, but I still prefer their packaging over their product. Although their smaller, curvier bottles would make terrible sea monkey homes, they remain seductively hip - which means I’m still tempted to buy POM products, despite the steep price tag and mediocre flavor. Of course, this is the essence of POM’s success. If you’re not swayed by its dubious health claims or bitter flavor, you still might give in to its cool factor. (Don Draper taught me that.)

Anyway, let’s start with the flavor, then move to the health “benefits.” POM is made from pure pomegranate juice, which tastes like a combination of grape and cranberry juice. So, if you’re the type of person who’s habitually torn between your morning juice options, this is the beverage for you. A word of warning, however - this juice tends leaves its sweet/bitter taste lingering on the back of your tongue, so be prepared to savor all that POM wonderfulness for a full half hour after you’ve drained your bottle.

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Drink Review: Purity Organic Apple Juice

Like most Americans, I stopped drinking apple juice after fourth grade, when slurping from a cardboard box abruptly lost its appeal (that is, until I discovered box wine 10 years later). From then on, apple juice played a smaller and smaller role in my life. It failed to follow me into adulthood, and therefore remains a liquid nostalgia trip, forever associated with recess and Power Rangers.

Why is this? Why do cranberry and orange juice stick with us after puberty, while apple never makes it past the elementary school checkpoint? Perhaps it’s too sweet for the adult palate, like bubble gum ice cream. Or perhaps it’s ignored because it lacks utilitarian properties. Apple juice won’t detoxify your bloodstream like cranberry, or fight your cold like orange. And it certainly won’t hide the flavor of that stale Smirnoff vodka you found in the back of your kitchen cabinet.

The time is ripe (heh), then, for an apple juice makeover - which is probably what the people at Purity were thinking when they drew up a snappy, modernist label for their all-natural, organic juice brand. Because who says that apples are lamer than oranges? Maybe this apple aversion habit is all in our heads, and it would do us some good to take a swig of the amber liquid. (According to the BBC, apple juice does have health benefits - it can prevent heart disease!)

Unfortunately, by not diluting their product, Purity has created a super-dense brand of juice. While regular, non-organic juice is often watery, the Purity brand is almost too thick. The first time I took a swig, I honestly felt like I was drinking a liquid piece of apple pie. True, you’re getting a bang for your buck with this product, but I doubt I’d be able to finish a bottle in a single sitting. I didn’t even try – as the thought of doing so kind of made me nauseous.

However, while the texture was a little heavy, the taste was A+. It was still sweet, but not overpoweringly so, and I definitely believe this product is 100% pure juice, without additives. You can tell it’s authentic because a fine layer of apple sediment settles on the floor of the bottle after periods of rest. Yeah, baby. That’s the real deal.

So ladies and gents, if you can handle the heady ride of undiluted apple juice, go for it. By swapping that juice box for a recyclable plastic container, you can placate your inner child without feeling like a baby.

• Purity Organic Website

Beverage Review: BOING! Fruit Juice

I love bunny rabbits and kangaroos and the sound they make when they hop around: BOING! BOING! (Okay, I know they don’t make that sound, but I watched a ton of cartoons when I was a kid, so play along.) I also like frogs and toads, and crickets and grasshoppers to a lesser degree. But I wouldn’t eat any of them. Not even if you paid me to write snack reviews about rabbit jerky, fried kangaroo bites, or honey baked insects.

I’m also a sucker for a well-designed, eye-popping, brightly colored logo. This appeals to my graphic artist sensibilities as well as my inner hummingbird. At the heart of all this nonsense is the juice. Ah, sweet nectar.

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