Caballitos Mandarin

   “Little Horses”.  That’s what Caballitos translates into and that’s the name of the beverage I’m about to consume.  To be technical its mandarin flavored Caballitos.  If I was a more learned man I would know why Mexican sodas seem to popularly end in “itos”.  Jarritos, Barralitos, and now Caballitos.  Hopefully in the next 13.5 fluid ounces (that’s 400 ml for my metric friends) I’ll be a little closer to that answer but probably not.  Since this soda is Mexican I don’t even have to worry about finding HFCS on the ingredients label.  Nope!  Good old sugar is what sweetens this drink!  The bottle art for Caballitos seems to be a horse exploding from underneath a bottle cap.  The explosion caused by said horse apparently disrupted the Universe of Orange as orange pieces are flying hither and thither.  Let’s open ‘er up shall we?

   Huff as I might I only get the slightest of scents from the mouth of the bottle.  The mandarin scent is so very, very faint but we still must press on!  Drink up!

   This is the tamest orange soda I think I’ve had to date.  There is very little carbonation, very little bite, and the flavor is just so very average.  This tastes as if you took Sunkist Orange soda and added 3 parts water but then somehow took away the sensation of “watered down”.  Caballitos Mandarin doesn’t taste like watered down orange soda… it just weakly sits there.  The horse on the side art must be trying to leave the bottle as he is much too powerful of a mascot to be left upon such a mundane bottle of soda.  (Spoilers from The NeverEnding Story are coming up next, so beware Ralph ”The only guy who hasn’t seen The NeverEnding Story” Stevens.)  Sadly, much like Artax from the NeverEnding Story he must sit there and slowly meet his demise.  “Artax, you're sinking! Come on, turn around, you have to, now! Come on! Artax! Fight against the sadness, Artax.”  That scene hurt me so very much as a child.  I was very attached to Artax since we’d been through so much together in that movie.  Then as an adult I watched the movie again.  The horse dies like 10 minutes after you first meet him… TEN MINUTES!  They jarred my fragile child psyche with the death of a horse I met ten minutes ago!  On a higher note… wasn’t that luck dragon creepy/cool?  Where was I… oh yeah (Spoilers End).  Caballitos is very average orange, sorry, mandarin soda.  It doesn’t taste bad but it does absolutely nothing to set it apart from the pack… well except re-injure my childhood’s emotional scars.

~A

Twist was rooting for the Nothing the entire time... he's heartless like that.