Well my regular readers know that I am a huge fan of coconut and there appears to be a trend for coconut water at the moment. I had never tried it before but expected to love it and I have also heard that there are quite a lot of health benefits that come from drinking it. I was assuming that it would be quite a niche product but a couple of my followers informed me that I would actually be able to find it in my local supermarket. Sure enough I found this carton of Vita Coco in Sainsbury's for £3.
For anyone not familiar with coconut water, it is not the same as coconut milk. Coconut water is the juice that comes from inside young coconuts, whereas the milk is made from the fleshy part. Apparently coconut milk has a high potassium and mineral content and it has hardly any fat, carbs or calories. Recently it seems to be thought of as some kind of energy drink because of it's apparent ability to enhance hydration.
I can't vouch for any of the health benefits but I figured that it would be a better option than the (albeit diet) fizzy drinks that I usually drink. What I was most excited about was the coconut factor as I assumed that coconut water would taste of like coconut. Well I was wrong!
The smell was quite strange to me, it was almost metallic and I am sorry to say this but I found the taste absolutely horrendous! It tasted to me like I was drinking dirty dish water; it was an almost soapy taste and certainly didn't taste of coconut. The worst thing for me however was the texture. You may remember me saying that I get freaked out about milk. Well the thing with milk is not so much the taste because I eat loads of milk based products, but it's that thick texture that sticks in the back of your throat...I feel sick just thinking about it. Anyway for me this coconut water was just the same. I was expecting something refreshing but it was think and syrupy in texture and I couldn't finish even the small glass in the picture.
Verdict
Sadly coconut water is not for me, it was not at all what I expected. I have never awarded anything 0 stars before and to be fair...erm I did like the packaging of Vita Coco so I will award 0.5 stars for that. No offense Vita Coco, I am sure lots of people love your coconut water as you seem to be very popular, but for me I have never tasted something so revolting!
Have you tried coconut water? What did you think?