Tried the handmade ones today at the store because the ingredients came in. The two flavours; very berry and lime are both really freakin amazing.
I basically acted like this when I tasted it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SR8g99wzzHU
Starbucks earns one point for the first time in a long time.
Thats great, lol.
The first time I tasted the canned one I didn't realize it was artificially sweetened and I gagged. Just can't stand the taste. Are the fresh ones able to be sweetened with classic or are all of them reduced calorie nasty stuff?
The canned ones are SOOO fake sweet and gross! But I mixed the strawberry lemonade one with vodka last weekend and it got me hammered :)
and I want to try the handmade refreshers so bad, but so far I haven't heard anything about them coming to my store. What's up with that? :(
The canned refreshers are sweetened with Stevia which is not artificial - it's from a plant. I haven't seen the ingredients in the handmade refreshers.
We got the ingredients in, but we have a "do not open until" date on our's that our store manager is enforcing. :F
I'll have to check out what's in the juices later. The VIA and the cans both have what appears to be real Stevia (not the fake Truvia stuff). It's just an acquired taste, I think, like the licorice root which 'sweetens' our Vanilla Rooibos.
NOOOOOOOOO!!! I hate new products introduced by SB...are these harder to make compare with Crappuccino?
@suckbuck
They're like teas. My manager ripped open the boxes like Christmas Eve, lmao. He didn't care about dates, but he told us to immediately throw it out if our DM or EcoSure walked in.
We don't have dedicated shakers yet, we made it with juice to the first line in the shaker, water, berries or lime, shake.
I'm excited to try these, despite having even more **** to make when we don't have room for any more product to begin with. Whenever I'm at work and it gets really hot I'm always dying for something fruity, and I wouldn't be caught dead drinking a smoothie.
We got all the stuff for them yesterday.
Also got the Refreshers Via, which is damn good. I hate Via usually, but I can't stop drinking the Very Berry Hibiscus ones.
It's the juice to line 1 and water to line 2 in the tea shaker with added lime or blackberries, ice, shake and serve. There's 100 calories in a venti lime and 120 calories in venti very berry hibiscus. But still lots of sugar. I don't remember reading that the handmade ones were artificially sweetened. It's also not that much extra to make. They're relatively easy so I wouldn't mind it. Only as much work as an iced unsweetened iced tea.
They will prob be more expensive than the teas and less expensive than frappuccinos.
Does anyone know exactly what the berries are in the very berry? I know the added berries are freeze dried blackberries. On the actual carton it just says white grape juice concentrate and natural flavors. I only want to know because I'm allergic to strawberries.
typically things like cat urine & yeti perineum sweat go under the "natural flavours" cover. but i can't say for sure whether it has strawberry or not. i would assume if they listed the grape juice it would list other fruits.
tried the canned raspberry pomegranate canned one today. it was like blue jollyranchers with green bean undertones. delicious. except I don't think they'll be coming to Canada because there's like an ingredient that's not allowed?
we do have all the mixes & freeze dried fruit thingies. can't wait to try one, i guess.
FML, my NYC store has received shipments of lime and blackberry cartons. I guess these refreshers are coming out company-wide.
@ Allison, thanks! Glad to know these are not hard to make, and looks as easy as making those iced tea and even iced coffee...
Just one more stupid drink we have to make.....are they going to pay us more? No.....
We just got our shipment today and I can't wait to try but in the meantime I have to figure out where to put everything with no help from either of my SMs. Does anyone know when this stuff officially launches?
@caffeinehigh
I want to say the first week of July? I was reading the Siren's Eye and it's the main focus of the Summer 2 launch. We made space in our cold bar fridge and put the berries and stuff near the rack with the powder.
Hopefully people will be into these and not order so many frappucinos.
I saw the lime juice come in a few weeks ago and asked what it was for... SM was like "I dunno, stick it on a shelf lol" It makes me laugh that I know what's going on more than her...
Yeah I guess it is one more product to make and still no pay raise lol but at least they are better than any cold drink we offer and it just means a partner beverage that is delicious but easy for your partners to make so whatever. I love coffee but never want it at my work because it's too hot. I like a cold drink.
We have a mandatory store meeting next week; I'm assuming we're going to learn about the refreshers then.
I noticed that the freeze dried limes and blackberries are from China. There's no way I am eating anything made in China. No matter what they say...they just don't have the standards that we have in the US.
I tried the berry hibiscus with black tea and it's to die for.
My store tested these last year. I straight up marked out a Trenta of the very berry hibiscus like 5 times a day.
I didn't like the lime, it got too bitter for me.
But my new store just got like 20 boxes of refresher juice and like 10 boxes of the freeze dried berries & limes. Didn't even know where to put all of it, haha.
We should get ours tomorrow. My DM told me the lime is really good with Citron. lol
So refreshers are available in trenta?
Tried them. Ugh they're so gross. I HATE the lime.
Very berry is good with passion instead of water though
I ended up loving Very Berry at the start and was addicted to Cool Lime by the end. the trick to making the lime not bitter is to omit the dehydrated lime slices. It's good with the peach bits though.
I made a Strawberry Blended Lemonade, but instead of lemonade I used the Cool Lime and added a couple pumps of coconut. It was amazing.
@kazan~ yep, another drink to take us away from the espresso machines. For us to shake for no reason...to turn around and be glared at by those who just want their basic, no frills espresso drink.
You must log in to post.