CBD oil, when taken by dropper through the mouth or under the tongue, has a taste that is politely described by advocates as “earthy.” For most, pure CBD oil is an acquired taste, and some prefer to take it with a spoonful of ice cream, or blended into a fruit smoothie to mask the flavor.
Why is it that the things that are best for us have a taste that “takes some getting used to?” When we’re children, our parents tell us to eat our vegetables and serve us heaping plates of boiled broccoli, Brussels sprouts and bitter-tasting greens. They show us cartoon pictures of Popeye and tell us we’ll grow big and strong if we eat our spinach, but all we really want is to get through it so we can have a piece of mom’s chocolate cake.
As adults, health gurus sell us things like wheatgrass juice, which is probably the most disagreeably tasting liquid on the market, looks like mulch from my lawnmower, has no proven health benefits and can cause nausea and constipation. Kombucha is another one with purported health benefits that actually tastes and smells like kitchen cleaning liquid and might better be used for that purpose. Yet health nuts continue to drink these things, smile through clenched teeth and say unconvincingly, “It tastes great! You can really taste the umami notes!” Which is what people say when something tastes like dirt.
Yet because unqualified New Age gurus continue to peddle it, we continue to buy it and choke these drinks down with relish. It is as if peddlers of health foods try as hard as possible to find the most awful-tasting “superfoods” imaginable and put a high price tag on them, to appeal somehow to our subconscious childhood memories of eating things we don’t like because our mothers told us that they were good for us.
Why can’t those things that are good for us taste good? Why indeed? CBD has caught on, and unlike wheatgrass juice, actually has studies that show its effectiveness as a treatment for stress and anxiety, headache and muscle aches, nausea and chronic pain. But what about the taste of pure, unadulterated CBD oil? True, you don’t have to drink an entire shot glass of it, but it still makes you think of those childhood days when Mom would give you a dropper full of cod liver oil, and you’d take it, because you knew you’d get a cookie after. Yes, CBD oil really is good for you and has countless proven therapeutic benefits. But keep the cookies nearby.
Fortunately there are alternatives. You can vape it and blow out huge clouds of glorious vapor and impress your friends. You can eat candy-flavored CBD gummies, CBD-infused cookies and chocolates, and even enjoy an ice cold CBD-infused beer. All of those things are effective and taste good, but still, those who have studied it still say that a few drops of pure CBD oil under the tongue is still the best way to get the most value out of it. CBD does have a low bioavailability level, which means that depending on how you take it, you may not be getting the full value. Those delicious CBD gummies are one of the easiest (and most fun) ways to take CBD, but if you want to feel the effects quickly, a few drops under the tongue is still the way to go.
Some of the more established CBD manufacturers have recognized that consumers want to take CBD in a way that allows for the maximum amount of it to enter the bloodstream in the quickest way possible, but they still want to take it in a way that is easy on the palate. GRN and other brands, offered by online retailer Nug Republic, offers a wide selection of CBD tinctures in flavors like Apple Cinnamon, Mango, and Vanilla, which make those drops go down easy.
There is a big interest in eating healthy, and with good reason. Proven supplements and over-the-counter treatments like CBD are getting more attention as the science behind the product continues to reinforce its value. But while we eat healthy, take our vitamins and maintain a daily regimen of CBD, those healthy things can taste good, too. Those fruit-flavored CBD oils have made taking drops a lot easier, at least for me.
