Beaver Buzz Stripped Sugar Free Citrus Energy Drink Review

I love Beaver Buzz. I especially love their Citrus energy drink. It became a staple during my last year of university. It was cheap and available everywhere around campus. Unfortunately, soon after, the Beaver Buzz energy drinks disappeared and I had to switch to alternatives. Now, they are back at one of the stores that used to sell them. In addition to some of the regular flavours, two new ones appeared, both from the Stripped line, which is the Beaver Buzz sugar free line. Since Citrus is my favorite, I just had to start with that one.

Taste

I poured the drink into the nearest cup and brought it close to my nose for an inspection. It smells great. It has a sweet tropical aroma with some citrus. The taste is...well...sort of weird. Lets get one thing out of the way before I go into the flavour. The drink does not taste like a sugar free drink nor does it taste like a regular one. It is somewhere in the middle. You notice the sweeteners, and they remind you of their presence in the aftertaste, but overall, the taste is not as sugar free as other drinks. I was actually impressed with this.

Now, back to the flavour. It is sort of dull compared to the regular Beaver Buzz Citrus. The same tropical flavours are present but they come out tasting like candy and not the real deal. The citrus is also present, but this time it can be noticed in the finish as well as in the aftertaste. Reading this, it sounds like the sugar free version of Citrus has all the flavours the regular has, well it does. Except that they have all been turned down a notch.

Overall, the taste is great for a sugar free energy drink, but compared to the regular Beaver Buzz Citrus, it loses in the taste department.

Energy

The can contains 200 mg of caffeine, which is fantastic. The regular Beaver Buzz Citrus comes in 355 mL tall, skinny cans and contains 188 mg of caffeine, which yields a caffeine ratio of 0.5296 mg/mL. The sugar free one comes in a 473 mL can, for a ratio of 0.4228 mg/mL. Don't be fooled. Though you are getting an extra 12 mg of caffeine with the sugar free Citrus, you will have to consume an extra 118 mL of liquid. I would go for the regular, skinny can.

Anyways, this drink works, though it does not have the same kick as the regular one. Since there is no sugar, the effects take a few extra minutes to kick in and I started to feel awake within 20 minutes. There were no jitters and I gradually went from feeling sleepy to fully awake. It took another 15-20 minutes to start feeling the full effect of the caffeine, and that made me a bit jittery and itchy to get up and run around. The energy was great though. But like all great things, there is an end...though it came hours after I consumed the beverage. Surprisingly the kick carried all the way to lunch, which was was about 4-5 hours after I drank the Beaver Buzz. The only other thing I had to drink in that period was a cup of weak green tea. Unfortunately, at the end of this great kick came the crash. I felt like it was midnight, I needed a bed. What I got instead was a cup of coffee, which helped me get through the rest of the day.

Medicinal Ingredients:

• Taurine - 2029 mg
• Panax Ginseng Root Extract - 425 mg
• Caffeine - 200 mg
• Niacin - 40 mg
• D-Glucuronolactone - 10 mg
• Guarana Seed Extract - 10 mg
• Inositol - 10 mg
• Vitamin B6 - 4 mg
• Vitamin B2 - 3 mg
• Vitamin B12 - 12 mcg
• Vitamin A - 350 IU

Non-medicinal Ingredients: carbonated water, sucralose, acesulfame potassium, citric acid, natural flavours, sodium benzoate, potassium sorbate

Scores:
Cost - $2.99 from 7/11
Taste - 8/10
Energy - 8.4/10

Overall - 16.4/20...a great tasting sugar free alternative to the regular Beaver Buzz, though I would still go for the original