Sprouts Tonic Water

Sprouts Tonic Water is the store brand tonic from Phoenix, Arizona based Sprouts Farmer’s Markets. It’s a highly sweetened store brand tonic; however it notably uses sugar rather than high fructose corn syrup.

Tasting Notes

Poured, Sprouts Tonic Water has a rapid effervescence and nice head. Medium sized bubbles remain in the glass. To the nose, there’s a slight tinge of sweet lime.

Sipped, it’s incredibly sweet. The bubbles retain only a bit of texture on the front of the palate— and then BOOM— they’re gone. Citrus hovers in the background suggesting lime early and then white grapefruit pith later.

The quinine, while present in Sprouts Tonic Water is rather mild. It makes it quite accessible and rather easy to drink; however, it also means that especially on the finish Sprouts Tonic Water lacks in a bit of character.

Gin and Tonic

I mixed Sprouts’ Tonic with some Back River Gin. The gin character takes over the nose with cinnamon and vegetal notes. On the palate— there’s plenty of cinnamon, but the high sweetness almost lends it a Big Red Chewing Gum type of flavor. The bitterness is felt perceptually on the palate but not quite tasted. The tonic recedes into the background, overpowered with an assertive gin.

Overall Sprouts Tonic Water

Sprouts Tonic Water is among the better of the store brands I’ve tasted. I like the use of real sugar and I think it gives Sprouts Tonic Water a better mouthfeel than many of its competitors.

However, when mixed with gin, you’re likely to get more sweet and less quinine. Ultimately, if a tonic water is going to be so heavy-handed with sweetener, I’d like to see it heavy handed with the bitter so both come through. Mix it with anything louder than a 37.5% ABV gin— and it’s lost.