Trader Joe's Sparkling Grapefruit Spring Water

Finally I have reached the end of this new line of sparkling waters. This is the last of them.

I poured small glasses of this stuff for Nina and myself at dinner Wednesday night. She asked what the flavor was before trying it. "Pineapple," I said. I wasn't trying to be deceptive. I just had a brain fart, and thought that pineapple was the last one we hadn't yet tried. (But we had.) We both sipped it, and had basically the same reaction: This doesn't taste anything like pineapple. On that basis, we faulted it for being way off.

The next morning, I sat down at my computer to write this review. I pulled the bottle out of the refrigerator to sample a bit more as I wrote. It was only then that I noticed the label: Grapefruit, not pineapple. Which, y'know, more or less explains why it didn't taste like pineapple.

So how is it as grapefruit? Well, it's accurate--it really does taste like grapefruit. And that brings the great advantage of removing the weirdness of the clash between expectations and actual flavor. But it's weak sauce. More like "hint of grapefruit" than "grapefruit," and therefore not very satisfying.


Will I buy it again? 

No.

Trader Joe's Organic Grapefruit & Ginger Splash

I continue to mourn the loss of Trader Joe's Grapefruit Sunset juice every time I think about it. It was the Platonic ideal of grapefruit juice.

As if to offer a balm to my aching heart, TJ's has recently come up with this blend, combining grapefruit juice, ginger puree, and lime juice. The feeling is a lot like that created by the cute new puppy that can't ever really replace the beloved old mutt, but nevertheless makes you happy in his own way. I'll never like this as much as the Sunset (which, by the way, was always a strange name; wouldn't "Sunrise" have been more fitting?), but it's pretty darn good.

Grapefruit is the heavy hitter here. At first it seemed as if I were tasting just plain grapefruit juice. But then I noticed the pleasant little mouth burn from the ginger. Even after polishing off the bottle, my impression was that the ginger makes itself known more from that physical sensation than from flavor. TJ's swears there's lime in there, too, but I could not detect it. (Nina's experience on all of this was way different, but I'll leave that for her to explain, if she chooses to do so.)

Overall, this is one of the best juice blends TJ's has on offer.


Will I buy it again? 

Enthusiastically.

Trader Joe's Pink Grapefruit Marmalade

Once in a while, I spot something on the new-products shelf at Trader Joe's, and know in about one millisecond that I'm going to love it. This was one such item. Pink grapefruit marmalade is something I've never even imagined before, but my instant soul-deep reaction was, "Yes, this is a thing that needs to exist in the world."

I was not wrong. The pink-grapefruit force is strong with this one. It's sweetened enough that it can serve the same functions as more traditional fruit jams, but not so much that you lose the tart essence of the base fruit (as happens often with, say, many cranberry derivatives). TJ's got this one just right.


Will I buy it again? 

Yes. I'm not ready to change my lifelong habit of strawberry or raspberry jam as the thing that belongs on morning toast, but this will make for a nice change of pace occasionally.

Villa Italia soda

No point in wasting time here: These are the best sodas I have ever had. They are both blow-you-away good. I can't decide which is #1 and which is #2. Whichever one I'm drinking at the moment is my favorite.

Both are going on my Top Ten list.

The only problem with them is that they are expensive, as soda goes: $2.99 for a 1-liter bottle. Which means that they can't be an every-day drink. But for an occasional treat, there's nothing better.


Will I buy it again? 

Silly question.

Nina's View

What Bob said. Very good. 

Trader Joe's 100% Florida Grapefruit Juice

Back in July, Nina and I did a comparison test of what I thought were all of Trader Joe's grapefruit juices. A commenter to that post pointed out that I had missed one, and indeed I had. This isn't actually "fresh squeezed" as the commenter said, but I'm sure it's what he or she had in mind.

I brought it home and with Nina at my side did a direct comparison test of this stuff against our gold standard, the superb, Top-Ten-worthy Grapefruit Sunset.

The first thing that's obvious--from the color--is that this is made from white grapefruits, instead of the pink ones used for Sunset. The taste confirms that; though we didn't do this taste-test blind, I'm quite sure I could have identified which was from white and which from pink even blindfolded.

But despite tasting different, I thought they tasted equally good. This really surprised me, because I had become pretty well convinced that no grapefruit juice on the market could be the equal of Sunset. I sipped one, then the other, back and forth many times, and I was very, very hard-pressed to say which was better. I finally decided that I had a tiny preference for Sunset, but it was mighty close. For all practical purposes, I'd be equally happy drinking either one, even though they are fairly distinct from each other.

There is, however, one factor that plays a decisive role in determining which I will buy in the future: price. Sunset is $4.99 for 64 ounces, or about 7.8 cents per ounce. This is $3.29 for 32 ounces, or about 10.3 cents per ounce. That's about 32% more per ounce. It's not 32% better. This alone keeps it from being a Top Ten item for me. Sunset is, I think, only a hair better, but a meaningfully better value.

If it matters to you in deciding between these two near-equals, Sunset is a product of Mexico, while this here stuff is all 'Murican. On the other hand, Sunset is organically sourced, should that be a deciding factor for you. (I don't much care about either of those things.)

The final difference is that this one needs to be kept refrigerated and consumed fairly soon. Sunset has some shelf life.

Note that despite the similarity of names, this is not the same product as TJ's 100% Pure Florida Grapefruit Juice, which comes in refrigerated 64-oz cartons and says "Ruby Red" across the bottom. That one is quite good, but not as good as either this or Sunset.


Will I buy it again? 

Maybe once in a while, but it has not toppled the king of the grapefruit juice hill as my default choice.

Spindrift Seltzer Made With Fresh Squeezed Grapefruits

This is sold by Trader Joe's, though not under the store's own brand name. It showed up last week on the "new products" shelf of the Asheville store.

I liked this more than I like most such products (i.e., carbonated but unsweetened beverages). There's not much real grapefruit juice here--just that from 3/16 of one grapefruit, if the claim on the box is to be believed. But it seems to make a real difference in the flavor, while adding only 15 calories to each 12-ounce can. The taste is, as you might guess, like diluted, fizzy, grapefruit juice.

It's not as good as real grapefruit juice, of course, but for a light, bubbly summer refresher, it'll do nicely.

Will I buy it again? 

Probably not. But I'd be happy to drink it if it were offered at a party or somebody's house. It might make a nice mixer, too.

Update: I wrote that after having just one of them. I gave one to Nina, and drank the last two over the next couple of days. I liked each one better than the last, and will now change my final verdict on the "buy it again" question to yes. It's on my list for a repeat purchase next trip to TJ's.

Nina's View

It should come as no surprise that I liked this. It's not sweet. It tastes grapefruity, but very lightly so—and with a nice back-of-the-tongue bitterness brought to you probably by some grapefruit oil. Very refreshing.

As a mixer, I think it would all but disappear, as the flavoring is very low-key. It makes a great summertime non-alcoholic sipper.

Trader Joe's grapefruit juices

I was pleased and intrigued by how the grapefruit juice I tried in yesterday's post was so much better than any I had purchased in a grocery store before. I wanted to try it in a direct test against other products. 

I went to the juice aisle of a standard grocery store, and could find only one item--the Ocean Spray "Ruby Red" pictured above. (It is of no small significance that they don't even use the word "grapefruit" in the name of the product.) 

At TJ's, I found three, including the superb "Grapefruit Sunset" reviewed yesterday, which costs $4.99. 

Trader Joe's 100% Pure Florida Grapefruit Juice Ruby Red comes in a carton and is found in the refrigerated section. Its list of ingredients is one long: "Pure Florida ruby red grapefruit juice." Like Grapefruit Sunset, it is pasteurized and not from concentrate. It appears that the only differences between the two products is that this one is not organically sourced, and is derived from ruby red grapefruit, instead of pink grapefruit. It costs $3.69. 

Trader Joe's Rio Red Grapefruit is, like Grapefruit Sunset, in a 64-ounce plastic jug, found in the non-refrigerated juice section. But that is their only similarity. Sadly, it's like so many other TJ's juice blends, with a base of grape and apple juice, and just enough of what should be the main ingredient to allow you to get some vague sense of its presence. Specifically, white grape juice concentrate is the first ingredient (after water for reconstitution), followed by red grapefruit juice concentrate, lemon juice concentrate, then flavorings and colorings. It costs $3.49. 

The Ocean Spray product does a little better than that, with reconstituted grapefruit juice as its first ingredient, followed by reconstituted grape juice, reconstituted apple juice, grapefruit pulp, and colorings and flavorings. I didn't keep the receipt from that store, so I can't tell you its cost. 

When Nina was here for dinner, I set up a testing procedure that allowed us to taste them with neither of us knowing which juice was which, but the numbers were as shown above. Here are the notes that Nina jotted down, which combine both of our observations: 

1. Insipid, sweet but uninteresting. Concoction doesn't taste very grapefruity.
2. Ruby red grapefruit flavor. Not too acidic. Not fresh squeezed.
3. Barely identifiable, intermittent bitterness.
4. Grapefruit, but sharp and a little bitter. Acid. Tastes pasteurized. Canned? 

There was absolutely no question that we both liked them in this order: #2, #4, #1, #3. Perhaps more importantly, the gap in quality between #4 and #1 was far larger than the gaps between #2 and #4, or between #1 and #3. Put another way, we would both willingly buy #2 and #4, but would not want to bring home #1 or #3. 

#2, the Grapefruit Sunset, was head and shoulders above the others, but #4, the TJ's 100% Pure, was a decent second-best. Given its significantly lower cost, I might choose it more often than Sunset. 

Since the taste test, I've been drinking all of them in kind of random order, a few ounces at a time. Doing so has reinforced the initial impressions from the blind testing. I'm happy with both the Sunset and 100% Pure. I can stand the other two, but they don't make me feel like I'm drinking real juice, and the overall impression is one of true mediocrity. 

Will I buy it again? 

Yes to both of the real juices, no to both of the sad blends. 

Trader Joe's Grapefruit Sunset

I've been burned time after time after time with Trader Joe's big, 64-ounce, plastic bottles of juice like this. They have generally been quite bad, and the labeling has often been deceptive. In fact, at first glance I thought this might be another in that sad line of disappointments; the name "Grapefruit Sunset" seems like the sort of thing they'd slap on a product when they knew they couldn't get away with calling it the most obvious thing, "grapefruit juice."

(To be fair, we have found a few winners, such as Honey Crisp Apple Cider Unfiltered and Pear Cinnamon Cider. And there have been some good ones in bottles other than TJ's ubiquitous 64-ounce plastic jugs: To The Power Of Seven, 100% Pomegranate Juice, Cold-Pressed Juice--Yellow, Tart Cherry Blend, 100% Cherry Juice, and others.)

But I looked more closely, and found that (1) it's organic, (2) it claims on the front of the label to be "100% organic pink grapefruit juice," (3) amazingly, it is not from concentrate, and (4) in the small print on the back, the list of ingredients is just one item long: "organic pink grapefruit juice." No pumping up the sweetness with apple and grape juices, no "natural" flavorings. This all gave me a glimmer of hope that I might have finally found the juice prince, after kissing way too many juice frogs.

So I bought it, and brought it home, and drank it.

The heavens did open, and choirs of angels did sing. At last, I had found One True Juice among the shelves and shelves of Trader Joe's impostors. This stuff is freakin' delicious. It is exactly what grapefruit juice is supposed to be. If I were having breakfast at a nice restaurant, selected the $5 fresh-squeezed grapefruit juice from the menu, and got served a glass of this, nothing would tip me off that the server had simply poured out some Trader Joe's Grapefruit Sunset instead of running actual grapefruit through a juicer just for me.

At $4.99 for the bottle, it's not as cheap as most of the "blends" that TJ's tries to pass off as juice, but it you measure it in flavor and/or enjoyment per dollar, it trounces the others.

Does this sound like the lead-up to the induction of a new member of the Top Ten list? Yes it does. And it is. It may seem odd to add to that list something so seemingly mundane as grapefruit juice. But this is probably as close to the pure, platonic ideal of grapefruit juice as can be found in any grocery store in America--and it's hiding right there among all the similar bottles of what Nina so aptly refers to as Trader Joe's "melted lollipop" line of juices.

Will I buy it again? 

It's already on my list for a second bottle on my next trip. I also have a half-baked idea to buy some other bottled grapefruit juices at other stores to compare them on cost and quality. I'm curious whether equally good products are readily available elsewhere, and, if so, how they compare in price. No promises, but there might be follow-up here.

Addendum 

Since writing the above, I had a glass of honest-to-goodness fresh-squeezed grapefruit juice in a local restaurant--and it wasn't as good as TJ's Grapefruit Sunset. I have also bought Grapefruit Sunset twice more, and have loved it again and again; the first bottle was no fluke.