Mello Yello

As many of you know I’m from Texas, and I’m just mad about Saffron.  This is an important fact to consider for the review today.  You see, I’m reviewing Mello Yello.  Mello Yello is a very mainstream brand and many of you may be wondering why I’m just now picking up a can to review.  So why have I, Aaron the Texan, decided that Mello Yello was important enough to review?  For whatever reason, Mello Yello has been nearly impossible to find in Texas for several years now.  It’s almost like Coke just kind of gave up on ever taking the market back from Mountain Dew.  I’m sure bringing it “back” to Texas was just a move that was fueled by money, but part of me thinks that SunDrop’s rise to national distribution might have had to do something with it as well.  For those of you not in the “kno”, Mello Yello is Coke’s version of Mountain Dew.  That’s the easiest way to explain what they were trying to go for when Coke created it.  It’s made with chemicals, orange juice concentrate, and now sits in a snazzy looking retro can in front of me.  I do love the can art by the way.  If there is one thing that Mello Yello has already beaten Mountain Dew and SunDrop on… it’s the can art.  So very simple, so very classic in styling, so very yello.  I mean, yellow.  I think it’s time to get this review started… quite rightly.

At first whiff Mello Yello puts off a scent more akin to Sprite than that of Mountain Dew.  However when I give it the old college try and breathe in a bit more the familiar scent of mixed citrus is what prevails.  Let’s see how well they compare in flavor.

Oh this will be easy!  Mello Yello is watered down Mountain Dew.  See ya next week folks!

~A

Ok, so maybe I should expound on this statement a little first.  If SunDrop or Mountain Dew didn’t exist then Mello Yello would be fantastic.  The fact that they do though makes you immediately compare each to another allowing us to not settle for a lesser soda which in this case is Mello Yello.  With each sip of Mello Yello you experience a rather flavorless journey until you near the end of it.  It’s almost as if they tried too hard to be refreshing and in doing so lost anything unique and fun about their beverage.  Only at the end of each gulp/sip/drink do you get the hit of citrus you probably expected since the beginning.  In the “Points For” category, I can identify several of the citrus flavors they used in making this, but the flavor overall is still a disappointment.  The carbonation works well with the flavor it’s given, but I honestly don’t care at this point. 

If any of you think I’m being too harsh on Mello Yello then know it’s with great sorrow that I do so.  One of my favorite advertising campaigns was that of Mello Yello.  Jim Varney, better known as Ernest P. Worrell, is still to this day only one of three celebrity deaths I’ve actually been saddened by in my time on Earth.  Sure the Ernest movies became overly stupid as they continued on, but the man made me laugh as a child and now as an adult.  During that time that he was making people laugh he was a spokesman for the “Make the Mello Yello Move” campaign.  To this day I can watch these commercials and enjoy them to the same degree I did as a child, if not more so.  I want to like this drink.  Ernest liked this drink, or was at least paid to.  I’m going to watch a couple of these ads, three of them actually, and see if it doesn’t improve upon my opinion of Mello Yello.  Be right back! 

Sigh….not even the great Jim Varney could sway my vote, and now  I’m more depressed than ever.  Back to the review.

Like I noted earlier the can art is awesome.  The can art hands down beats the competitors.  Let’s me focus on the can art for a moment and hopefully that will get me out of this funk.  The design on this Mello Yello can seems to harken back to simpler times.  Simpler Times, when a Peanut Farmer was President, when a stamp cost you 15 cents, and when a gallon of gas was under a dollar.  Guess what?  I wasn’t alive back then so the retro can is unable to work its magics on me.  Mello Yello is watered down Mountain Dew.  KnowwhatImean?

~A

I'll probably be snuffed out for telling you this, but it's too important not to.  Twist. Is. Vern.