Drink

Every drink entry in the Typed food library. Each one is a full page: what it does, stage by stage, and what the evidence says.

• Alcoholic BeverageAlmost all the energy in a spirit comes from the alcohol itself, not from sugar.
• Almond BeverageA low-calorie drink that is mostly water. Check the label for added calcium — that is the part that matters.
• Almond MilkA seventh of milk’s protein. Everything it does offer was added at the factory.
• Apple JuiceAn apple with the fibre removed and the sugar left in.
• Beer (Full Strength)Mostly water, alcohol, and calories your body prioritises burning.
• BeverageChocolate milk drinks are mostly milk. The powder adds flavour, sugar, and sometimes added vitamins.
• Beverage BaseMostly sugar with some cocoa — the milk you mix it into does most of the nutritional work.
• Black TeaAbout a third the caffeine of coffee, with tannins that blunt iron absorption.
• CiderFermented apple juice, where about half the kilojoules come from the alcohol rather than the sugar.
• Coconut BeverageFortified or not is the whole question — and either way it is not a swap for milk on protein.
• Coconut WaterSold as nature’s sports drink. It has the wrong electrolyte for the job.
• CoffeeThe most widely used stimulant on earth, and one of the best studied.
• Coffee MixInstant coffee, sugar and a fat-based whitener dried into one powder. The coffee is the smallest part of it by weight.
• Cola (Regular)Liquid sugar with no fibre to slow it and no satiety to show for it.
• CordialDiluted to taste, which is exactly the problem.
• Cordial BaseThis is a syrup meant to be watered down, so the numbers on the table are about four to five times what ends up in the glass.
• Cranberry Juice DrinkThe UTI evidence is thinner than the marketing, and this is mostly added sugar anyway.
• Decaffeinated CoffeeNot caffeine-free, and not stripped of everything else either.
• Diet ColaNot the villain it is painted as. Also not the win it is sold as.
• Drinking ChocolateThree-quarters sugar by weight. The cocoa is the minority ingredient.
• Energy DrinkA coffee’s worth of caffeine, a cola’s worth of sugar, and B vitamins for show.
• EspressoReads as the most caffeinated coffee there is. Per cup, it usually isn’t.
• Fruit DrinkA fruit drink is not a fruit juice, and neither one is fruit.
• Ginger BeerThe most sugary thing in the soft drink fridge, sold on a health-food association.
• Green TeaThe calm-alert combination is real. The fat burning is a rounding error.
• Instant CoffeeA genuine niacin source, and the coffee with the most acrylamide.
• JuiceA glass of fruit juice and a squeeze of lime are not the same kind of food, even though both are juice.
• KombuchaLive cultures, yes. A probiotic in the sense the word actually means, no.
• Lemon JuiceToo small a serve to feed you. Big enough to change what your gut absorbs.
• LemonadeThe soft drink people order when they’re avoiding soft drink.
• Mineral WaterPlain mineral water is water with dissolved rock in it. The flavoured version is usually water with sugar in it.
• Oat BeverageWhether an oat milk is worth choosing comes down to whether calcium has been added to it.
• Oat MilkThe step that makes it taste sweet is the step that removes the point of oats.
• Orange JuiceReal vitamin C and folate, arriving with none of the fruit’s fibre.
• Red WineThe heart-health story was real research. It did not survive better methods.
• Rice BeverageCloser to thin rice water than to milk — there is almost no protein in it.
• Rice MilkThe thinnest of the plant milks, and the one with an age restriction.
• Soft DrinkThe whole range splits in two: sweetened with sugar, or sweetened with something that carries no kilojoules.
• Soy BeverageThe thing worth checking on the carton is whether calcium has been added. Unfortified soy milk has almost none.
• Spirits (40% ABV)The purest form of the thing itself: alcohol, water, and essentially nothing else.
• Tonic WaterAs sugary as lemonade, and the only mixer containing an actual drug.
• Vegetable JuiceThe one juice that isn’t a sugar problem. It’s a salt one instead.
• WaterTap, bottled and sparkling hydrate identically. What differs is fluoride, sodium and price.
• White WineRed wine’s polyphenol story doesn’t apply here. The alcohol does.
• WineMost of the energy in any wine is the alcohol itself, not the sugar.

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