Coming straight from the 7-11, Wolverine inspired X-Treme Cappuccino! This has all the stuff that you were finally hoping for in these silly vended cappuccino drinks; melted coffee candy taste, cool silly corporate packaging and for the first time, real and actual caffeine content! If you have seen these fakey coffee drinks but always passed because the caffeine content was that of a diet soda, for a limited time you can taste the glack and feel it too.
This whole thing is from the same marketing team that planned the whole Simpsons campaign last summer. Freshworks and 7 Eleven created a whole slew of Wolverine Movie tie-ins, from slurpees to Big Gulps. This is the first time they ever did a hot drink as a movie tie in though – which I found interesting. According to a 7 Eleven rep, they did this whole tie in because since they were coming out with a new flavored cappuccino drink anyways, and the Xtreme name fit – so they thought they would experiment and see how their first hot drink worked. 7 elevens were banking on the fact that more teens and people in their twenties are drinking more coffee – and is in fact their #2 seller in the stores ( the first is tobacco – big surprise). In my opinion – movie tie in or no, this should score a big win.

Taste:8
Ever stuck a slurp of one of those International Delight Coffee Creamer cups? It tastes just like a big yummy cup of Coffee-Mate with some melted Werthers coffee caramel candy in it. If you really want coffee, go somewhere else. If you were looking for a real strong Italian cappuccino, go forth to your closest green mermaid. This stuff is the candy coated powdered hot chocolate version of it – hot and sweet and gooey and delicious, even though it tastes like it was made wholly without coffee bean. Just a suggestion, but if you have never had of these, start off with a small 12oz cup. It is sorta like eating chocolate chip Belgian waffles with strawberries, syrup and whipped cream – some things are best kept to small doses.

Nutrition/Buzz:
Infused with taurine, a 12-ounce serving of X-Treme Energy Cappuccino, contains the same amount of caffeine as an 8-ounce can of Red Bull (or a shot of real espresso) . This is HUGE for these vending drinks, as most of them have almost about as much caffeine as a Coca-Cola. While this one as about 80mg of caffeine ( from guarana even – not even from coffee) the french vanilla, by contrast, has 35mg in an 8oz serving.
So is there any coffee in here? Buried in the ingredients list you can find it. But not the first ingredient, that is Sugar. This is followed by Non-dairy Creamer, a preservative, another preservative, a third one, and a fourth one. Then comes Artificial Color, Artificial Flavor, Non-fat Dry Milk and Whey. Finally, after it all, you can find the Instant Coffee, right before the artificial flavor, salt and Silicon Dioxide. So – its not like this is even close to anything resembling coffee – or even real food. But that’s OK. Sometimes a little lab made caffeinated goo makes for the occasional tasty treat.

Packaging:5
Kinda goofy idea, coming up with seven dollar mugs with little decal slashes on them. Thermo mugs – good. Seven dollar thermo mugs with fakey graphics on them? Bad. Who do these get marketed to? Grownups would not ever spend 7 bucks on something like this – and I just can not see young teens hanging out with a coffee mug slung in their backpacks. Sure, getting one mean it will cost less than the price of a regular hot beverage at 7-Eleven’s, but that means you gotta be drinking a lot of these energy cappuccinos to make it worth your while.