Royal Hawaiian Orchards, purveyor of all things macadamia, has introduced a new product onto the nut milk scene. Its new line of macadamia nut milks is ready to take on almond milk, cashew milk and other dairy alternatives.

I got a sneak preview of the recently launched product. I tried the unsweetened vanilla flavor. The first thing I noticed was that you should heed the advice on the box: shake well. I failed to do this so my first taste was thin and watery. But once I gave the box a better shake, the consistency resembled other nut milks. And like other nut milks, the nut-specific flavor is subtle. If I concentrated, I could get the sense of macadamia. But if I didn’t know that’s what it was, I might not be able to tell it from almond or cashew milk. This was especially true when I added it to cereal.

So how does it stack up nutritionally? It’s low in calories. An eight-ounce serving has only 35 calories, 30 of them from fat. Surprisingly for a nut-based drink, it includes zero grams of protein. Its strengths are calcium and vitamin E, providing 50 % of the recommended daily dose of each. Also notable are 25 % of Vitamin D, 10 % of Vitamin A and zero sugars. This profile is very similar to the Trader Joe’s unsweetened vanilla almond beverage I usually drink. My other standard non-dairy drink is Trader Joe’s unsweetened soy beverage, which has a different profile – 7 grams of protein per serving and 50 % of the recommended daily B12, though how much of that is bioavailable is a mystery to me.

The new macadamia nut milks come in original and vanilla, with a sweetened and unsweetened version of each. If you’re a macadamia nut fan, should definitely try them and see if you can catch that subtle, buttery taste of the classic Hawaiian nut.