You know by now that soda is almost always empty liquid calories. But while fruit juice sounds like it should be a healthy beverage choice, depending on the brand, you might be doing yourself just as much of a disservice as if you’d ordered a Pepsi. Even the very best fruit juice isn’t as nutritious as the fruit it originally came from, because the fiber that makes a piece of fruit so filling has been stripped away: Instead of filling your belly like an apple or an orange, juice just passes through your gastrointestinal tract like a little stream of sugar. It’s like listening to “Hey Jude” without the “Na-na-na na” part at the end. The sweet melody is intact, but the soul is lost. So as a rule, always choose the original version (that would be the fruit) over the Muzak version (that would be the juice).
But that doesn’t mean juice is a terrible choice—after all, it’s still a great way to get your daily quota of vitamins and minerals. Problem is, a lot of what food marketers try to sell us as “juice” is about as healthy for you as, well, being chased down a highway in a white Ford Bronco. Read this list to see what terrible atrocities we've uncovered. For each one, we've also included a healthier alternative. Or, as the Beatles might say, we took a bad juice, and made it better. Just call it “Hey Juice!”
Worst Cranberry Cocktail: Ocean Spray Cran-Apple
8 fl oz
130 calories
0 g fat
32 g sugars
Ocean Spray makes a whole line of cranberry juice blends, but there’s only one thing you need to know: They’re all polluted with unruly loads of added sugar. The first two ingredients here are water and sugar, the hallmark of an inferior bottle. In fact, the best juices in this line have only 27 percent juice. This one? A paltry 15 percent. Go with Ocean Spray’s Cranenergy line instead. Compared to Cran-Apple it delivers slightly more real juice, a far weightier package of vitamins, and just over a fourth as many calories.
Drink This, Instead!
Ocean Spray Cranergy Raspberry Cranberry (8 fl oz)
35 calories
0 g fat
9 g sugars
Worst Mixed-Berry Blend: Welch’s Mountain Berry
8 fl oz
140 calories
0 g fat
33 g sugars
The flowering bouquet of fruit on the outside of this carton makes it appear to be just one step down from a smoothie, but in truth, it’s just one step up from Sunny Delight. Regardless of what Welch’s wants you to think, this juice is made with only 25 percent real fruit, and with this many calories in each cup, you should expect nothing less than 100 percent. Go with Bolthouse Farms 50/50 Berry blend and you’ll trade out the sucrose for an antioxidant- and flavor-rich blend of purple carrots, blackberries, pomegranates, and blueberries.
Drink This, Instead!
Bolthouse Farms 50/50 Berry (8 fl oz)
120 calories
0 g fat
28 g sugars
Worst Lemonade: Minute Maid Lemonade
20 fl oz bottle
250 calories
0 g fat
67.5 g sugars
In 99 percent cases, lemonade contains between 10 and 15 percent lemon juice, meaning that 85 to 90 percent of the calories are added as table sugar or high fructose corn syrup. The reason we pinned Minute Maid as the worst lemonade is that with this bottle, they’ve dropped the lemon juice concentration down to 3 percent, and at the same time, jacked the sugar level up to soda-like proportions. In fact, this bottle has more sugar than a same-sized bottle of Coca-Cola, not to mention a bevy of preservatives, fillers, and artificial colors. The only lemonade we’ve found that can legitimately call itself “juice” is the one below by R.W. Knudson. It replaces the added sugars with a blend of apple and grape juices.
Drink This, Instead!
R.W. Knudsen Lemonade (8 fl oz box)
130 calories
0 g fat
30 g sugars
Worst Juice Imposter: SoBe Elixir Cranberry Grapefruit
20 fl oz bottle
250 calories
0 g fat
63 g sugars
With a name that references two fruits, you might expect this bottle to provide a respectable dose of real juice. Unfortunately that’s not the case. The only juice this bottle carries is used as a coloring agent, which means every gram of sugar here is added during processing. That puts it right alongside soda as one of the worst beverages at the supermarket. Cut calories by looking for water-based beverages that use juice as a sweetener and flavoring, like the one from Olade below. The few calories it has come from a blend of lemon, pinapple, mango, and passion fruit.
Drink This Instead!
Olade Tropical Juice Beverage (16 fl oz)
20 calories
0 g fat
4 g sugars
Worst Grape Juice: Tropicana Grape Juice Beverage
15.2 fl oz
290 calories
0 g fat
72 g sugars
