So...Orange Juice isn't What it Seems...

My favorite thing about the fact that all orange juices are flavored is how much the orange juice industry freaks about when people talk about it, so we'll see if I get a letter from them.

Anyway, the fact that they think OJ being "flavored" is the problem and not the part where it's an inherently unhealthy sugar beverage is really something. Will we ever move beyond this? Maybe not...

Sources:
Carbon footprint of Concentrate vs Bottled

Aaron Carroll on Juice

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[rocketsocks]

Another industry juice trick: if you reconstitute frozen juice concentrate with something other than water, such as white grape juice, you can create a franken-juice that has more sugar in it than natural juice, but you can still label it as "100% juice".

[sullivannick]

"they don't teach you that in wine school"

[joostvanrens]

In OJs defense: I haven't had scurvy in months

[klopfenpopmusic]

I thought this was going to be about the buckwild process by which juice is stored, loses it's flavor, and has scent volatiles added back in MONTHS later. That's interesting enough to warrant a follow-up video imo. I love food science!

[paulthorn]

"Don't let people shame you into buying the more expensive option just because it's more expensive". -Whole Foods has entered the chat

[chaerodactyl]

Hank's gonna get disappeared by Big Orange now, he's in TOO DEEP

[danielbickford]

So fun fact, you can extract at least some of the flavor compounds out of citrus rinds yourself at home. It's really simple and it's called oleo-saccharum. You dumped your orange rinds into a bowl and dump roughly an equal amount by weight of sugar into the bowl with the orange rind, let it sit and stir every so often, you can let it sit over the weekend for maximum extraction, and it will pull out a syrup. The resulting syrup has a fairly strong Citrus flavor and you can add it to various drinks. It's most commonly added to alcoholic drinks and mixers, but you could probably add it to baked goods as well. From personal experience it makes for an interesting lemonade though. The Tang from the lemon juice and a big whiff of orange makes it tastes almost like orange juice.

[bleep]

I used to drink concentrate juices a lot as a kid, i enjoyed them and have been mildly confused about the hate on them, so im glad Hank is in support of them to some degree

[ameliafrandsen]

The frozen one always felt like a delicacy growing up. I'd just grab a spoon and eat a spoonful every other day, and it was magical. Oh the simplicity of youth.

[unclejezzier]

this is a brand of Vlogbrothers that I don’t feel like we’ve seen much of lately… welcome back fools!

[kjpcgaming]

The best way to get orange juice is to eat an orange - the fiber in it actually helps with the sugars in it. I have diabetes and am under the care of a nutritionist. Whole orange has fiber - orange juice removes the fiber - that's what makes it bad for you. :)

[quinnobi]

I lived in Spain for some years. There were a fair few places that had these machines that would fresh squeeze oranges right in front of you. They even had a clear front so you could watch the apparatus working. Oranges went in a basket on the top, and juice came out the bottom. Presumably the rest of the orange ended up in a bin that would get thrown out. It was some of the best orange juice I've ever had, on the few occasions that I would get it.

[samfitz]

“Sometimes… things that are expensive… are worse.”

[poplar]

"Sometimes, things that are expensive... are worse." - Freckle

[nitrodavid]

I have never seen orange concentrate in a freezer (from Australia), I thought the 3 locations you were going to say you could find orange juice was from fresh oranges, the fridge section for orange juice and the shelf-stable non-refrigerated orange juice and you were going to talk about how they can make something shelf-stable while still trying to keep its taste.

[doctorcis]

I recall there was a news broadcast about how certain manufacturers were using flavoring agents in the concentrate that came from different places than their fridge variety, which resulted in the orange juice in the fridge using no oranges grown with a banned fungicide, but the same brand in concentrate did.

edit: also the flavoring agents aren't just there for consistency, they are there because the orange juice is stored in deoxygenated tanks, but the process sucks all the stuff responsible for smell and flavor out leaving you with pulpy sugar water, so they have to put the flavor back in.

[catarthic]

this feels like an episode of the good place and hank is arguing to the judge about the ethics of orange juice

[silversleeper]

I didn’t know I was going to listen to a grown man rant about orange juice for 4 minutes when I woke up today, but I guess this is my life now 😂

[Alice_Walker]

I'm from Australia, I find the juice for breakfast thing an interesting cultural phenomenon. It's not something anyone I know does here. I only ever buy juice if I'm making mimosas or cocktails 🥂

[BlubberyNuggets]

I feel super vindicated--when I was a kid adults were always telling me I was just picky when I said orange juice was gross/didn't taste like oranges, and then later when I preferred a specific brand of orange juice. Turns out I was right that it doesn't taste like oranges AND that they're all designed to taste different. A weight has been lifted