After one too many dances with Maker's Mark the night before, former editor Heidi arrives to the office feeling less than her typical bubbly self -- and in need of a hangover cure to get through the day. Pürblack's directions recommend mixing a pea-size amount of the tarlike substance into a beverage. First, Heidi experiments with stirring it into a cup of water:

Heidi: [Gingerly sips drink, then wrinkles nose.] "It's not so bad." [Sips and wrinkles nose again.] "Yeah. It's not so bad."

Mixing it into Coke Zero yields slightly more delicious results. "I can't even taste it," she proclaims. After finishing the hangover cure concoction, she has "a distinct taste of charcoal in [her] mouth. Very Weber Smokey Joe." Two hours later, Heidi still feels the (heart)burn, headache and stomach upset. "[I'm] no better, really," she says. A Carl's Jr. burger makes her churning stomach feel "a little better," but her head is "still blah."

"I was also burping charcoal for a bit, but I think it's because I drank the soda so fast," she muses. Pürblack: 0. Maker's Mark: 1.

Grade: 2/10

If it's made for children then it's probably good? We're not sure if that's 100 percent true, but Pedialyte is the trusted beverage for rehydrating sick little tots, and we're curious to see how it is for us "adults" (we're still fighting that title).

"Pedialyte helps to rehydrate the body due to its salt and sugar content, both of which allow the body to absorb water more effectively," says Alexandra Miller, RDN, LDN, corporate dietitian at Medifast. "However, there is a lack of proof as to whether Pedialyte works better than drinking plain water and consuming nutrient-rich foods that naturally provide electrolytes." That goes for little kids who can't keep anything down and big kids who put way too many down the night before.

Still, with a bottle of tequila and Pedialyte at the ready, managing editor Mary gave the famous hangover cure a try.

After what Mary refers to as the "The Night of a Million Margaritas," she was all too eager to give Pedialyte a go the next morning.

"I had to wake up at the crack of dawn (OK, 8 a.m. but that feels extremely early when you go to bed at 2 a.m.) to clean my apartment and prepare brunch for some out-of-town visitors," she says. "I woke up with a headache, but for the purposes of this experiment, I decided to forgo Ibuprofen, and I chugged some Pedialyte instead.

Her conclusion: "I was really impressed. I'm normally a Gatorade girl, but I found Pedialyte to work much better. It tasted less sugary (read: easier on the tummy), and still seemed to help hydrate me. Even though I still felt tired, within an hour my headache faded, and I was able to function well enough to speedily clean my apartment, hit the grocery store, help cook breakfast and power through the rest of the day."

Grade: 9/10

There's a saying in this country: Why do anything difficult if there's a pill you can swallow instead? OK, that's not an actual saying. Still, if there were a pill that magically cured hangovers, we'd all be drunks. Well, get ready to embrace your inner wino, because there is, in fact, an FDA-approved hangover cure pill that goes by the name of Blowfish.

"Be wary of pills that claim they 'cure' hangovers," Miller warns. "Many of these lack scientific evidence to support their use. Blowfish consists primarily of aspirin and caffeine, and while these ingredients may help lessen the symptoms of a hangover, it is important that they not be used as an excuse to drink more." Now where's the fun in that? No, really, we jest!

While we're not entirely convinced by the hangover pill's vague claims, they do offer a money-back guarantee -- which we like to think of as the sign of a promising product.

A self-described rosé aficionado, Allie decided to give Blowfish a try after a cozy night of sipping all the vino from her Club W shipment. "I'd like to say this was done somewhere cool, like by the fire pit of my friend's beachside cottage or over dinner at a fancy, no-corkage-fee restaurant, but really I was Olivia Pope-ing it at home with popcorn."

Though Allie did get up several times throughout the night to drink water, she skipped the Aleve that usually chases away her hangover by morning. But come 10 a.m. Allie was feeling her hangover's full effects (aka throbbing headache). So she dissolved two Blowfish tablets in water and took a tentative first sip.

"I was skeptical of the taste, but it was actually very mild -- and the bubbles were good for soothing my queasy stomach. It took a few minutes for it to kick in, but the caffeine was powerful. I felt much more awake and less groggy." Coming from a 10-cups-a-day coffee drinker, this sounds like a ringing endorsement.

"Really, I just wanted the painkillers to kick in so my head would stop hurting. Once it did, I felt all right -- probably much better than if I hadn't taken the Blowfish. Was it a magical hangover cure? No. But it did settle my stomach, gave me a boost of energy and eventually diminished my headache."

Grade: 8/10