Fizzy, freaky.

A couple of months back I reviewed the unusual children's seltzer offered by my nearest supermarket, a 7.5-ounce can in bubble gum flavor. Which I did find to have a good taste of bubble gum and to be appropriately refreshing. I don't know if the kiddies really like it, but then, I think they encounter more things that taste like bubble gum than actual bubble gum these days.

Anyway, following that post, I had a request from an anonymous reader to get some of said seltzer up on eBay, because Anonymous wished to purchase some and the brand, Nature's Promise, is a house brand for Giant and Stop & Shop supermarkets in the northeast, where I assume my unnamed friend does not live. Unfortunately I don't have an eBay account, nor do I know how to properly ship fizzy drinks. I imagined a box full of water by the time it got anywhere, the cans having exploded en route. The best I could do was see if any of the national brands had something comparable, and I did find something. Sorta.

Polar Seltzer is a fine brand of beverages, mostly seltzer but lots of good standard sodas as well, like ginger ale and cream soda. They make a lot of flavored seltzer, including flavor blends that are quite nice (strawberry watermelon, cranberry lime, blueberry lemonade, etc.). I had read that they made some specially for kids, and according to Bustle, at least one of them -- Unicorn Kisses -- had a bubble gum taste. So I thought I'd have a closer look.

They make six of these kiddie seltzers, with weird names from mythology like Pixie Lights and Minotaur Mayhem. I could not find those two, however. The ones you see above were the flavors at my local Shoprite. Two of them were in Halloween dressing last week, but they are available all year long. I was most keen to try the Unicorn one because of my recommendation, but I wanted to see what was going on with the others. The names -- Mermaid Songs, Dragon Whispers, Yeti Mischief, and the forenamed -- tell you nothing about their flavors. It's guessin' time!

I can usually tell what Polar seltzers are supposed to be immediately, which is a credit to them; flavored seltzers have no juice and no calories, so the makers have to construct the flavor with virtually no ingredients. In the case of the four kiddie seltzers, though, I -- like the Bustle writers and the reviewers at Mass Live -- had a hard time pegging just what they were supposed to be. It doesn't mean they were bad though, not necessarily. Here are my thoughts, which I wrote down before thoroughly reading the reviews linked:

Yeti Mischief -- started a little citrusy, but with a strong berry or perhaps raspberry finish. Bustle's tasters called it "limey and piney" but they are wrong. Mass Live also went the lemon-lime route, missing the berry flavor. But it is so freaking obvious. Man, no wonder people can't find Bigfoot.

Dragon Whispers -- more aggressively berry-flavored, but definitely has a grapeishness to it. Bustle went the citrus route on this one as well, falling into the trap! But Mass Live, who liked this one the most, called it -- berries and grape. The reviewer did think that the purple dragon on the can may have influenced the detection of grape. I think that's wrong, but I will say that the other reviews of these products seem to make these the Rorschach test of sodas.

Mermaid Songs -- also grapey, but something guava or papaya about it. A light taste, hard to pin down. Bustle consulted a Bon Appetit writer who probably nailed it best: Swedish Fish. I give the Mass Live guy points for trying: "foamy sea spray mixed with orange Starburst."

Unicorn Kisses -- tasted like sour gum, not bubble gum, to me; after a couple of cans the best I could come up with was: Jolly Rancher with the fruit part removed. If you took out all the flavors that make different color Jolly Ranchers taste different, what you'd be left with is this. Definitely my least favorite of the four I tried, although Bustle was more forgiving. Their reviewer also got the Rancher vibe but found it to be like a watermelon one, which I can imagine but barely, with a strawberry bubble gum aftertaste, which I think is too generous. Mass Live said it is an "an airy whirlpool of bubblegum cotton candy flavors" which I agree with if by "airy whirlpool" you mean "underflavored mess with no cotton candy flavors."

So I'm sorry, Anonymous; in my opinion, the one supposedly the most bubblegummy was the one I liked least, and one I wouldn't recommend. I hope you had better luck finding your beverage.

Perhaps my groundbreaking essay from September will encourage Canada Dry or Schweppes to make a Bubble Gum Seltzer. Wouldn't that be refreshing!