Two for the Road

We have heard some scurrilous rumours that all we talk about in our blogs is drinking wine. To respond, we have teamed up for this special edition where we do some ranking of the non-alcoholic beverages we’ve tried on our travels to date!

First we’ll give you a drink description by geographic area, then we’ll be ranking the drinks!

Adriatic

• Turkish Tea – Served black and sweet, in small glass cups. This earthy malty tea was everywhere in Istanbul.
• Greek Coffee – So thick you could stand a spoon up in it (and believe us, we tried), Greek coffee is like an espresso made from super fine coffee grounds that you drink down instead of filtering out.

Thailand

• Thai Tea Latte – Neon orange coloured iced tea with milk and sometimes condensed milk added, it’s fragrant, rich and can be ordered hot or over ice.
• Whole young coconut – Sounds like what it is – a whole coconut, usually with the green husk around it, with a hole in the top to sip out the coconut water. In some places this also came with a spoon to scoop out the soft coconut flesh from the middle.

Japan

• 7/11 Iced Coffee – Hi-tec iced coffee. You grab a cup of ice from the freezer and pay for it, then visit the iced latte machine where you pop in your cup, select some preferences and watch as your iced latte is whizzed up.
• 7/11 Yuzu lemon soda – Convenience store soft drink. It’s a carbonated cloudy lemonade. Shout out to Kyoto lemonade, Big C and CC lemonade which scratch a similar itch and can be found in other convenience stores and vending machines dotted seemingly every 500 metres in every Japanese city.
• Sencha Green Tea – Hot green tea often served at the end of meals in Japan. An elevated version of green tea you get in the UK
• Matcha – A Japanese institution, Matcha is used in traditional tea ceremonies. This isn’t your Starbucks variety! It’s not sweet or served with milk. Instead it’s hot, grassy and earthy, whipped with a bubbly foam on top with a traditional bamboo whisk.
• Lawson Blueberry Drinking Yoghurt – Like a levelled up Actimel, this creamy drink includes fruit pieces and comes in many other flavours too!
• Boss hot vending machine coffee – Yes, Japan really are living in the future. As well as cold they also have hot drink vending machines where you can get bottled or canned coffee, perfect as a pick me up but also a hand warmer on cold winter days.

Oceania

• Solo – Australia’s answer to fizzy cloudy lemonade.
• Bundaberg Ginger Beer – Iconic Ginger Beer from Australia which comes in squat brown glass bottles with a ring pull closure. It’s fizzy, spicy and as we were there at Christmas we also got to indulge in their extra spiced festive edition.
• Long Black – This is a type of hot coffee which comprises of a shot of espresso pored over a small amount of hot water to retain the ‘crema’ on top of the shot. Think of a richer Americano.
• Mother energy drink – Oceania’s answer to Monster Energy.
• L&P – New Zealand’s answer to fizzy cloudy lemonade. This has the addition of Paeroa, which gives the drink a slightly savoury bitter undertone.

South America

• Mate – A cornerstone of Argentinian culture, mate gourds and thermoses can be spotted on pretty much every street and park when we were in Mendoza.
• Pepsi Black – Pepsi Max’s Argentinian equivalent, it comes in a fully black can (yes, including the ring pull). And maybe it’s just the sleek design fooling us but we felt it had a slightly less sweet recipe than its British cousin.
• Inca Kola – Neon yellow fizzy drink which can often be spotted being shared by youths and aged alike as they chat on the streets of Peru’s capital. It tastes exactly like Irn Bru.
• Chicha Morada – A sweet Peruvian drink made from a type of purple corn. It’s definitely not savoury, though. It’s rich, sweety and flavoured with apple, cinnamon and lime. Served chilled and usually over ice, this unique drink is everywhere in Peru.
• Lucama smoothie – Lucama is a native fruit to Peru and is often used in desserts, juices and smoothies, as well as having a peachy vibe, it also has a maple syrup type flavour.

UK

For comparison, we thought we’d include a few ‘benchmark’ drinks in our rankings, to help contextualise for our UK audience! No explanations needed for these ones:

• 7up Free
• Monster White
• Cuppa Tea
• Flat White
• Diet Coke

We’ve each given each other a bit of leeway when it comes to the other person’s preferred drinks. This is why Matt’s been able to stop Iris from putting all coffee drinks into the Absolute Toilet Water tier. You’re welcome, fellow caffeine addicts!

Hope you enjoyed this departure from our usual blogs and all you wine-drinking-criticisers feel summarily disproven in your accusations!

We’ll be back to usual programming soon filling you in on our time in Lima, Peru.

Iris & Matt