You Like-a Da Juice?

Yeah, we like-a da juice. Trader Joes is carrying high-fructose-corn-syrup (HFCS) free, organic juices now. Great stuff. Tasty in a rum drink, a vodka drink, a vodka & rum drink, poolside. Good to feed to well behaved kids who accompany their parents to come over & swim in a strange pool on a hot Arizona day. Inexpensive, refreshing, natural, and good for you.

We've found it's quite difficult to find ANY Mango nectar without HFCS. Nearly every mass marketed juice has it (as well as yogurts, cereals, frozen dinners, et al). Scoring another delicious Trader Joes organic find, we feel triumphant. The low calorie lemonade doesn't have any fake sweeteners in it, just less sugar than most obese Americans apparently need to maintain their girth. On a hot day, after working in the yard from 9am to noon, I can quaff a quart of the lemonade without much pause. Yummy!

Dr Desert Flower has a proclivity for Pelligrino. My attempts to illustrate to her the inordinate carbon foot print of the carbonated Italian water is dismissed off-hand by the draw of the Italian bubbly. Now, trader Joes has these delicious, inexpensive, local alternatives (at least they did not come via sea freight container, over the Atlantic) for less than a buck a piece. They offer both Lime and Lemon varieties, as well as unflavored bubbly. And yes, according to vodka aficionado DFF, go very well in a mixed drink when called upon to do so.

Lastly, regarding coffee - the way caffeine was meant to be delivered, in high doses, in the morning and sometimes after a good evening meal, I've begun sourcing organic alternatives to the mass produced, mass grown, enmasse-song-bird-killing, massive carbon foot print imposing mega canister coffee.
When in a hurry, and I don't have time to grind up a batch of beans - or I am talking on a conference call and can't go on "mute" to silence the grinder, I brew up some of Costco's Organic medium roast blend. It's pretty good - not awesome, but it does the trick when trying to wake up at 5am.




When I have more time, there's healthy organic alternatives from Trader Joes, grown in Bolivia and Sumatra, each of which I've enjoyed a full pot throughout a week-day morning of conference calls. Yes, these have a larger carbon foot print than Mexican coffee, but I have not found a delicious Mexican coffee yet - and while I LOVE Kona coffee, I've not won the lottery yet to be able to afford drinking it every day. And, both the Bolivian and Sumatra beans are "Fair Trade" so they are supposed to be helping 'local growers' - perhaps they are, I don't know for sure. Long Before "Mad Men" I learned to distrust marketers.

I wish I could find some "shade grown" coffee that is kind to endangered South American song birds... but in Red State Arizona, I am not sure I'll ever be able to. And even if I DO find some, I'll then have to convince DFF that it tastes good enough to be a staple in our pantry.