JAVA MONSTER, CAFE LATTE

coffee can photo
Name ----- Java Monster, Café Latte
Purchased From ----- Harris Teeter
Nation of Origin ----- USA, California
Price ----- 3.49
Volume ----- 15oz 443ml
Cost per Ounce ----- ¢23.3
Caffeine Content ----- 200mg
Keywords ----- Large Can, Value, High Caffeine

I was hesitant to include java monster in this lineup for a few reasons. First was that I wasn’t aware of the Cafe Latte flavor, which forgoes vanilla or mocha for just coffee and milk. Obviously anything with flavor would have violated my buying rules. I was only able to find Cafe Latte at Harris Teeter and a Speedway gas station though, so it may not be available in all locations yet. More than that though, Java Monster to me isn’t coffee, it’s an energy drink. It’s a coffee base enhanced with taurine and guanine and other energy drink chemicals. Those chemicals give it an extra layer of flavor which, if they were good, I would say counts against my coffee and cream rule. Sadly, they aren’t good.

nutritional facts

Maybe it’s just because I’m not well versed in the world of energy drinks, I only started having them a little while ago, barely earlier than coffee. It was a roadtrip back from upstate New York and despite having a full nights sleep I was struggling to stay awake in the passenger seat. Pulling off at a gas station I didn’t want to get a standard energy drink but didn’t want to stoop to Starbucks. So I got a Java Monster, the mean bean flavor and I chugged it. I didn’t hate it nearly as much as I thought I would, and was overall pleased with the experience. Going back to them with a fully rested mind, though, and the energy drink flavor really dampens what would otherwise be a good coffee experience.

If you like that sort of flavor I can see this being a good choice for you, but for me I’ll pass. How do I even describe that flavor its, chemically in bad ways you know? Theres an almost saccharine sweetness to it, not helped by the sugar content certainly. The vanilla and mocha flavors can help to mask that a little, and I really don’t want to imagine what the Irish cream variant tastes like. The horror… Still, it can’t be denied that for a lot of us Americans this may be the only thing available that does have the mermaid on the front, and you get a lot of energy bang for your buck in a package thats not altogether intolerable, and for that I have to give some credit. God bless you, Java Monster, you and your comedic flavor text and high volume cans.

FLAVOR SCORE-4/8

VALUE SCORE-7/8

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