The freshly opened bottle tickles my nose with a citrus-y mandarin feather, but I’m having a hard time detecting the lime.  With a swig, I get that first rush of sweet from the agave, then an orange tang, followed by a hint of lime.  None of the flavors really overwhelm the others except for the sweetness; at least you can say that oogave knows how to play it mellow with the flavors, if you’re into that sort of thing.

I think that Esteban could really play around with the flavors a lot more, make them familiar but interesting.  The sweetness always seems to take control of my taste-buds before the real flavors get a chance to take them for a ride.  I really wanted to like this soda more, but the sugars are the only thing my tongue has any memory of now that I’ve finished the bottle.  Although, I do feel fuller.

Score: 3 out of 5. The understated flavors disappear under the agave sweetness.

– WiseGuise

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Popping the top, my nose is greeted by  light, grapefruit-y scent, sweet and bubbly as your favorite waitress.  The taste follows with an undeniable link to the citrus waft, although more hinted at than fully explored, finishing with a grape-y mellow sweetness with a lingering memory of grapefruit o the back of your tongue.  None of the sour or bitterness I expected is evident, which is usually associated with this particular fruit, but not necessarily in a bad way.  Many are turned off by this pithy flavor in grapefruit, which is unwarranted.  Good grapefruits are sweet.

The agave tends to coat your mouth and throat, definitely leaning this towards being a sipping soda.  The agave nectar does seem to make me feel fuller after topping off my lunch with this, I don’t need to hit the water cooler or find something else to snack on.  I am refreshed and full.  I found this a welcome alternative to traditional sodas, oogave definitely has something here.

Score: 4.5 out of 5. A tad sweet, but definitely a citrus soda I will remember.

– WiseGuise

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Alright, folks, time to try another soda from oogave.  (Check out our other oogave reviews).  Today I’m trying their cola flavor – the benchmark flavor of any self-respecting soda company.  I wonder how it’ll stack up.  Side note: my current favorite is the surprisingly complex Red Bull Cola – it tickles my fancy as a chef with its unique ingredients, and the flavor tickles my tongue like a good cola should.

I crack open the bottle and am greeted by a peculiar fragrance – something between a root beer, a cola, and a bite of something I can’t quite put my finger on… let’s see how this comes out in the flavor.

Well, the bite part came through a little bit, but not so much on the root beer and cola flavors.  In fact, it’s hard to pick up any distinct flavors in this.  How can I best describe it?  It’s flat.  Hollow.  It has no real body and a weak, astringent finish.  It lacks the sweetness of the other flavors (all of oogave’s current flavors have 24 grams of sugar per 12 oz bottle, and most of them do very well with that relatively small amount.)  It doesn’t say “cola” to me, nor does it remind me of any soda flavor.  It’s like very watered-down molasses mixed with citric acid.

Rating: 2.0 out of 5 - Healthy concept, but the flavor just isn’t there.

-Danithius-

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Time to pop open another oogave – this time it’s their Ginger Ale.  I take a whiff and am punched in the nose by a fresh ginger scent.  It smells real, not like some kind of ginger flavoring or powder.  It’s intense… I wonder how much will come through in the flavor?

Answer: a whole lot!  This is definitely on the intense side of the ginger-ale spice scale.  It has a honey-sweet (agave-sweet, actually) flavor that works well with the ginger extract.  Despite the sweetness, this flavor clocks in at only 24 grams of sugar per bottle.  Impressive.  It does have a slight astringency on the back end, but some of that can be ascribed to the ginger extract.

After nursing half of the bottle, I’ve decided that I’m a fan.  I like the bold ginger flavoring – it’s completely different from the “Dry” ginger ales that flood the popular market.  And yet it’s not so spicy that it’s overwhelming – it’s very sippable.  This could be a great palate-cleanser, or an accompaniment to a spicy meal.  It’s refreshing.

Rating: 4.0 out of 5. A spicy, agave-sweetened ginger ale that’s low on sugar yet high in flavor.

-Danithius-

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The folks at Oogave were kind enough to send us a sampler of their six Agave-sweetened sodas. As always, we use the same criterion to judge samples sent to us as we do for our normal reviews. (Though we do give priority in the review queue to them).

Today I’ll jump right to the flavor that first caught my eye – Watermelon Cream. I just now popped open the bottle, and I’m trying to figure out what candy this smell reminds me of. Cotton candy? No. Bubble gum? No… Razzles? Arg, it’s going to drive me crazy.

OK, enough time contemplating the smell, I’m thirsty. I take a sip and let it sink in. There is definitely a bubblegum high note in this, with middle notes that deliver the watermelon flavor nicely. I’m surprised that Oogave pulled off this sweet flavor with only 24 grams of sugar in the whole bottle. (Our favorite measuring stick is a 12 oz can of Coca Cola, which contains 39 grams. There are sodas with even more sugar, but a can of Coke is a good average.) I pour some out into a glass, and am amused to discover a nice light pink-champagne color. The drink doesn’t taste very creamy to me, but the bubble-gummy flavor works well together with the watermelon.

I could see this making my regular rotation – it has low sugar, a refreshing flavor, and a rare choice of sweetener. There are a lot of interesting facts about agave nectar, the most striking of which is its low glycemic load. On oogave’s website they assert that agave nectar has a substantive feel, which helps your body know when it’s “full” in a way that HFCS doesn’t. To use their words, your body “doesn’t allow you to pound down a two-liter bottle [of oogave]. It will let you know when you have had enough”. I just like the fact that oogave is actually advocating moderate use of its product! (And not because they’re forced to, like liquor companies).

For my part, I did feel “full” after drinking this bottle, but I was never one to “pound down a two-liter bottle” of anything, especially HFCS soda, so I don’t know what the difference is like. Maybe I’ll take one for the team and try an experiment sometime…

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.0 – A solid agave-sweetened soda with an original flavor and low sugar.

-Danithius-

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Now for the product itself: it smells like a caramel-rich root beer, like a root beer flavored lollipop.  The flavor is rather understated.  It is lightly sweet, which is nice – the agave nectar is supposed to be sweeter than normal sugar.  This 12 oz bottle has 24 grams of sugar, which isn’t bad at all for a root beer.  But I feel the flavor lacks the rich and earthy punch that I expect from a good root beer.

I just finished off the bottle, and I do indeed feel full.  Moreso than if it was a regular soda, so it appears that claim is correct.  I liked it, but I don’t think I’ll try this one again.  I am, however, curious to try the other flavors.  I see potential here.

Rating: 3.5/5 - Low-sugar yet filling, low glycemic index, but in need of a more flavorful punch.

-Danithius-

***Review Rebuttal!***

I like the scent I smell, something here that isn’t in other rootbeers, almost like a coffee.  Carbonation is right, nice and creamy, but not a lot of bite.  It seems more like a cream-soda to me than a rootbeer.  Sweetness and body is perfect, but fails as a true rootbeer; I like it more as a cream-soda.  Score: 4 out of 5.

– WiseGuise

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