Jim_Callahan: talkertopc: I don't care, coffee taste better than energy drinks by several order of magnitudes, and so does Pepsi or Coke.

/Dr Pepper also I guess but its taste is way too sweet for me.

In fairness, bitters in general are pretty much the textbook definition of an "acquired taste".  Short version is that you probably like the taste of coffee because, well, you forced your way through the bitterness initially when drinking it for other reasons (e.g. to stay awake) and your body eventually associated the bitter edge with the caffeine rush.  Ditto cigarettes but with nicotene, no one actually likes the taste of their first cigarette, the preference is developed by association.

This isn't something that's unique to stimulants by any means, actually literally the same principle applies to the larger amounts of sugar that american foods are loaded with (for political / economic subsidy reasons) in the first place-- a lot of other nations statistically tend to feel about American bread and sugar-heavy soft drinks roughly how a typical teenager feels about their first cigarette or cup of coffee, because it's not "normal" for them.

The advantage energy drinks have is that they already taste like something the target audience is already drinking, by design, so there isn't that initial hump to get over of "I like the caffeine rush, but getting it tastes like taking farking medicine".

So, like... you're not wrong, but you're sort of missing the forest for the trees.  This is one of those "opinions" that you have for pretty concrete biological reasons tied to the way humans adapt to things, even calling it a personal preference, while true in the literal, technical sense, is kind of skipping over the point.  If everyone magically stopped selling coffee for a generation and then it was re-introduced, it would not be re-adopted.  Honestly probably the same for traditional soft drinks, though not for energy drinks, because energy drinks actually don't have a taste.  Like, any individual energy drink has a taste, but literally you can fortify anything with caffeine at this point in technology so they're intentionally designed to just taste like whatever is popular.  The original energy drinks were starbucks double-shot cans, guess what they tasted like.

// That said, the overall assertions of the article are... dubious at best, for similar reasons.  Coffee is a relatively specific set of ingredients but "energy drink" can literally be anything other than the caffeine itself.  Making broad assertions about a category that can be basically farking anything based on this kind of tiny sample size is going to give you data of dubious utility even if your results are, strictly speaking, correct.

// The general, and take this with a giant grain of salt too because of how much variation there is but in general, the profile of ingredients for a typical energy drink tends to be the same as a "vitamin supplement" outside of the caffeine, meaning an ingredient list that sounds like it might do something but actually does nothing whatsoever outside of the caffeine itself.  Celsius is my personal vice at the moment, and its list is like: Vitamin C, serves a biological purpose but doubtful you don't already have the maximum you can absorb from food; Taurine - does literally nothing unless you're feeding it to your house-cat, it's a thing only obligate carnivores ever fall short on, B12 - does literally nothing, almost by definition you already get something like two orders of magnitude more than your body needs from diet even if you only eat junk food, various salts - sound sciencey, do nothing (for extra irony the NaCl "table salt" they don't write down for the inverse reason is actually potentially good for you, as it IS something some diets fall short on), etc.  All of these are advertised as giving you 'natural energy', but do nothing-- however, the 200mg of caffeine gives you hella energy.

clkeagle: natazha: I'll stick with my drip coffee maker. Haven't tasted an energy drink that I liked.

Agreed. All of them taste like a middle school chemistry experiment to me. I've never tasted one and thought "I want to drink this every day."

Coffee was always fine to me with cream and sugar, and eventually I was able to back off and eliminate the sugar. It wasn't so much an acquired taste as it was "I'm drinking too much Coca Cola--there has to be a slightly healthier option that I also like."

The_Six_Fingered_Man: CrazyCurt: Likwit: That's too bad. I have no risk factors, but the sugar free Monster in the white can is one of my guilty pleasures. shiat is amazing.

Same with Rockstar. If I can get it the sugar-free fruit punch. But I live in a wasteland where Target is the only store and they are picked clean every day. Nothing in stock.

/ Nightmare.

I drink a can of Rockstar instead of coffee each day. My local stores don't really carry it all that much (mostly just gas stations) because Monster is bigger here for some reason. So, I set up an auto ship from Amazon and an 18 pack shows up on my doorstep every two weeks. Works wonders.

Marcos P: Beneficial to my farkin dentist..

Marcos P: Beneficial to my farkin dentist..

CrazyCurt: Likwit: That's too bad. I have no risk factors, but the sugar free Monster in the white can is one of my guilty pleasures. shiat is amazing.

Same with Rockstar. If I can get it the sugar-free fruit punch. But I live in a wasteland where Target is the only store and they are picked clean every day. Nothing in stock.

/ Nightmare.

Likwit: That's too bad. I have no risk factors, but the sugar free Monster in the white can is one of my guilty pleasures. shiat is amazing.

transporter_ii: Jim_Callahan: In fairness, bitters in general are pretty much the textbook definition of an "acquired taste".
In the food world, if something is sweet, your body usually tells you to eat more of it because it is probably safe. Bitter could be something poisonous, so your body will send signals to not eat too much of it.If you are trying to lose weight, you can hack your appetite by eating something bitter and it will cause you to eat less.In times past, people ate more bitter things. It's been nearly eliminated from our western diets now. The obesity epidemic nods in approval.