Sometimes Foodie: Sprite Lymonade Legacy

Sprite Lymonade Legacy - Walgreens

Sprite has released a new limited edition soda celebrating 50 years of Hip-Hop. It's Lemon-Lime, Strawberry, and Lemonade flavored, which is a little tricky to say, and awkward to type, but it sounds great for summer. I'm excited to get sippin'!

First, a little packaging-love.

The label is text-focused with a halftone pattern in the background. A nice throwback to press-based printing techniques, but the pattern also reminds me of sound waves, which ties in to the music theme really nicely. I'm a sucker for texture, even when it's just implied. The pink and yellow color combo stands out in the beverage case, and caught my eye right away. On the side, there is a QR code made to look like a vinyl record sleeve, again, very on-theme, and scanning it gives you access to music-related contests and benefits. Most of them seem to be Drake-focused (for now), so if you're into that, be sure to check it out. But it says that "drops" will be happening all summer long, so maybe there will be more artists and opportunities in the coming months. I have no Hip-Hop knowledge, so I won't be speaking to any of that from here on out. I'll just be focusing on the flavor.

Since the bottle is transparent, you can see that instead of crystal clear soda, this looks like lemonade. Visually, that makes complete sense because this is essentially a carbonated, strawbnerry-lemon-lime-ade, right?

Not really. Take a closer look, there's no hint of pink in sight, and only 1% juice listed on the label.

So it looks like lemonade, opened, it smells like lemonade, but it isn't actual lemonade at all. It's like, food science witchcraft. Delicious smelling witchcraft, but witchcraft none-the-less.

Opened, it smells sweet, tangy, and fruity. Very recognizable as lemonade, but more-so in the powdered drink mix sense of things. Think pink-colored Country Time lemonade mix, not the real deal. Only this isn't pink at all. (Smells pink, looks yellow.)

Taking a sip, it's lightly carbonated, sweet, yet tart, and for something that doesn't look pink AT ALL, it tastes pretty pink. The flavoring is more authentic strawberry than I expected it to be too! I'm really impressed!

I can't tell you the last time I reached for a Sprite. Lemon-Lime soda is something I gravitated towards as a kid. As an adult, I find it too sweet for my sipping needs, so I normally only buy it as an ingredient in making something else. But this is very different from normal Sprite. The tartness from the lemonade flavoring, though artificial, makes it much more drinkable for me, and it's really refreshing. Especially for a soda.

I don't know how they made it taste so lemonade-like without more actual fruit being involved, but I fine with that being a mystery. This is perfect for summer, and probably my favorite Sprite flavor of all time. Definitely check it out before it's gone!