Vape Train Australia Mother Energy
ConcreteRiver
Disclaimer: I didn't pay for this, shoutout to Vape Train for sending this to me.
Setup: Recoil w/ flavor barrel, Dual 12 wrap 24g 3.5mm SS316 @.32 ohms. 60w power, 450F temp limit. Full Cotton Wicks.
Testing: Vape Train Mother Energy, 1%, 4% and 8%, 60/40 VG/PG base, Steeped 41 days.
Flavor Description: Mother Energy is an actual energy drink in Australia and New Zealand that I’ve never had, so take all this requisite amount of grains of salt. I am, however, an avid consumer of chemical energy slurry in general so I’ll be coming at it as a fan of the genre, if not this specific drink.
For the ‘muricans, this leans toward Monster. Apparently Mother is manufactured by Coke, so that makes some kind of sense. It has some of that playdough vibe that seems familiar from the original green can of monster that I don’t really get from red bull. Not too overwhelming as far that kind of flavor goes but doesn’t taste much like the brighter, cleaner red bull.
The original mother apparently used a good deal of acai palm juice, but I’m sort of struggling to pick up anything too distinct on the fruit side of the house. I do maybe kind of light hint of some kind of dark berry at lower percentages, but it’s pretty fleeting overall. Heavy citric acid kind of tartness without any clear specific citrus notes to it. Just feels like whatever usual tart chemical byproduct they use in most energy drinks. Slight herbal, bitter hit that could be standing in for the guarana and all that, but doesn’t feel any more herbal than most energy drinks.
Basically a pretty straight forward sweet tarts dissolved in battery acid kind of vibe. Fairly heavy sweetness, but it feels like a bit more a dry sweetness instead of a vaguely syrupy beverage HFCS beverage sweetness. Overall reads a bit dry and moderately harsh.
Off-Flavors: Can’t speak to authenticity for Mother in particular, but nothing that feels out of place for a energy drink profile in general.
Throat Hit: Moderate to Harsh. Pretty throaty in general. Maybe a bit harsher than FW Green Goblin which is the closest analogue concentrate I’ve tried.
Percentage testing: At 1%, this feels fairly dry. Clear “energy” taste to do it, but those playdough notes are at least sort of in control. Soft berry fruitiness here. Actually feels fairly well balanced here, but the texture is kind of thin and it doesn’t feel completely fleshed out.
At 4%, more playdough. Whatever berry I was getting is pretty much gone. Feels much more generically tart up here. Maybe a tiny bit of that acai cocoa hit up here, but it’s sort of hard to tell over the taste of that energy thing. Starting to get a bit sweeter, and fairly throaty but feels less dry and a bit more beveragey.
At 8%, even heavier on the energy. Pretty massively tart and sweet without much nuance. Comes across as fairly harsh.
Vape Train suggests mixing this at 1-5% or 5-9% standalone. I’d be on the lower end of that. I think I’d be using this an accent around 2% or a fuller, bolder flavor around 5%.
Uses & Pairings: Well, it’s an energy drink flavor. So you’ll mostly want to stick with fruits.
Since this is already fairly harsh and can read as a bit try I’d stay with juicier, more mellow fruits. Would work with some apple or pear to bulk it up a bit and take some of that really aggressive edge off. I could see a more mellow guava or juicier mango flavor too. If you wanted to play up that red berry thing, could work well with a heavier syrupy pomegranate like TPA Pom Deluxe. Or maybe a pretty mellow raspberry like FW Razzleberry.
Or add some black licorice and roll your own jager bomb.
The nuance here is pretty subtle compared to something like FW Green Goblin. For the most part, if you’ve already got Green Goblin or another energy drink flavor you’re big into, I’m not sure this brings all that much new to the table.
Second Opinions: Still not much out there on the google.
No notes on the ELR page, but it did get used in a couple of recipes including this. It could work beautifully (?) but just looking at that recipe completely destroys my will to live. Risky click of the day.
Here’s the product page from Vape Train. No real description on this one.