SodaStream Review and Giveaway

Some of our very best friends have a soda maker that they received for a Christmas gift one year.  We love going to visit at their house and being treated to their “homemade” soda or soda water mixed with juice. There’s just something of a novelty about making your own carbonated beverages!

Needless to say, my whole family got excited about the opportunity to review the SodaStream.  We received our SodaStream machine a few weeks ago – the very day we were getting ready to leave for Cincinnati!  But that didn’t stop us – we got it out of the box, set it up, and went right to work making some soda to sample. 

Set-up is very simple and quick and the actual soda-making process is the same way – SIMPLE & QUICK.  We took pictures just to prove how simple it really is (it’s right up there with making some Kool-aid or mixing up some chocolate milk).

When you pull the machine out of the  box, it’s basically ready to go.  All you need to do is install the CO2 tank in the back (which is easy peasy).  Then you turn the machine around and it looks like this --- 

Cute, huh?  As you can see, it’s taller than the space between my counter and cupboards, so I needed to find a new home for ours.

In addition to the machine and the CO2 tank, we also received a nice variety of soda flavors to try.  Of the 5 regular flavors pictured to the left, our favorites are the Orange Mango and the Energy drink.

We also received 4 diet varieties.  We are not generally fans of diet soda in our house and tend to steer away from diet drinks due to Ashley’s allergy to Aspartame.  However, these diet varieties contain Sucralose (Splenda brand).  Gracie and Ian have been enjoying the Root Beer and I’m partial to the Ruby Red Grapefruit (which is quite sweet, not sour as you might expect).

The first step in making your soda is to fill your 1-liter bottle with cold water.  Simple enough, right?  Then, you screw the bottle onto that white post you see sticking down from the machine (I’m sure there’s a more technical term for it!)

Then you push that button on the top of the machine 3 times (or more or less, depending on your carbonation preferences).  This injects the CO2 into the water (via that white posty-thing) and voila! You now have carbonated water.  A bit of trivia here:  do you know that people in European countries (such as Italy and Germany) drink carbonated water all the time?  Personally, I think it’s an acquired taste. 

If you want to flavor your carbonated water, you simply fill a cap with your favorite flavor, dump it into the water bottle, screw on the lid, and gently turn the bottle up and down a few times to mix. 

Here’s the end result ---

YUM! 

Another option is to make flavored waters. We received a package of 3 water flavorings. I thought I would prefer these to the soda flavors, but actually . . . well, they aren’t my favorite. I’m going to try adding them to plain water and see if that’s better. 

Around my house, soda tends to be a special occasion drink.  So, if your family is anything like mine, your kids will be begging to make soda daily!  I’m sure that, at some point, the novelty will wear off a bit; but for now, we’re having lots of fun with our SodaStream!

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THE GIVEAWAY!

SodaStream has generously offered to give ONE of my readers a a Fountain Jet Soda Lover's Start-Up Kit (approx. $100 retail value.) It includes the winner's choice of black/silver, white or red/silver Fountain Jet, CO2 to make over 100 liters of soda, 2 reusable carbonating bottles, a sample pack of flavors, and 3 full-sized flavors of the winner's choice.

I know you really, really want to win one of these for your family, don’t you?  So, I’m going to make lots of options for entries – the more you do, the more comments you leave here, the better your chances of winning!

MANDATORY ENTRY = Leave a comment telling me why you would like to win a Soda Stream. 

EXTRA ENTRIES (leave a separate comment for each thing that you do. If it’s worth 2 entries, leave 2 comments, etc.)

• 1 entry = Become a Fan of SodaStream on Facebook
• 1 entry = Follow SodaStream on Twitter
• 1 entry = Follow my blog, Reviews & Reflections, by clicking “follow” in the upper right-hand sidebar
• 2 entries = Add my button to your blog (be sure to leave a link so I can check it out!)
• 2 entries = Share about this contest on your Facebook page, with a link back
• 5 entries = Blog about this contest with a link back (be sure to leave a link to your post!)

I will leave this contest open until April 30th at 11:59pm EST. NOTE:  SodaStream can only ship to addresses within the continental U.S. (sorry international readers!)  I will draw a random winner on May 1st.  Good luck!

NOTE: I received this product, free of charge, from SodaStream. The thoughts shared above are mine, based on our experience with the product.