Japan. Food experimentation. The maxim for Japanese companies seems to be that if two foods exist, and have, until now, never been combined, no greater reason is needed to combine them. This is surely the logic behind ramen carbonara, meat ice cream, and now, Cucumber Pepsi. The label on the bottle boasts of the "suprising" fusion of cucumber and Pepsi. The thing is, cucumber strikes me as one of the most pointless vegetables to combine with something else. It has to be one of the least strongly flavoured, and would pale in insignificance behind, say an onion. So why combine it with Pepsi? Coke released their zero calorie variant this month, so I am betting that this was Pepsi's last minute attempt to put something, anything, new on the shelves. Perhaps the decision involved putting the names of all vegetables into a hat and the Pepsi CEO picking cucumber out?
Anyway, didn't really fancy it myself, so got my girlfriend to try it out for me. She said it smelt like mouthwash and tasted like cough medicine or perhaps dishwashing liquid. I think the photos of her face describe it pretty well...
Edit: I have since tried it too. It wasn't too bad. Not especially disgusting. Not especially good. It tastes quite like a cocktail but without the alcohol. Fruity, but certainly nothing to do with cucumbers. The problem is, that it's a drink that no one would ever, under any circumstances, have an urge or desire to drink. Perfectly drinkable, but not the kind of thing you would buy and so destined for failure. Which is sad, as we need more ridiculous products in the world.
5/10.
