2020 summer activities are – how shall we say this – geographically limited. how many variations of activities can we do in the park with the small same group of friends in your germ circle? after many a park picnic with take out, we decided to do something different – a taste test (and ratings!) of hard seltzers.
hard seltzers have been incredibly popular in the last few years, emerging as a new category of alcoholic drinks next to beer, wine, and hard alcohol. they generally appear clear and taste like flavored sparkling water (think LaCroix) – so how is it alcoholic, you ask? in America, these drinks are made with carbonated water, fruit flavoring, and fermented cane sugar or fruit – resulting in a gluten-free bubbly beverage with about 5% alcohol content. the first beverage like this was made by Spiked Seltzer in 2013, and now White Claw and Truly are the big industry leaders.
a can of seltzer is also a lot easier (and arguably more refreshing) to bring to a park hang than sharing cocktails or dealing with a whole bottle of wine during pandemic social life. turns out our idea for an afternoon of seltzer sippin’ has us in the majority for quarantine drink choice! hard seltzer sales are up 224% compared to the same period last year compared to a mere 19% uptick for beer.
so – how does one conduct a seltzer taste test? we set out to buy as many single cans of different flavors as possible. availability of single cans seems to be dependent on your locality’s liquor sale laws and ordinances. I always wondered why I couldn’t buy a single can of beer at a grocery/liquor store near me, Craft Beer Cellar on H St – turns out its because of DC Government ABRA rules. local government! huge plug for Craft Beer Cellar though – you can buy a single can from any 6-pack in their store to mix-n-match, great for people like me who get bored easily, or for people who want to do taste tests! we also grabbed a few singles and a from the Whole Foods down the street, totaling 14 different flavors.
while pre-taste test Aditi really meant to take single pictures of each can – during-taste test and post-taste-test Aditi forgot to do so – which is why ya’ll getting stock photos sorry 
ratings were based on overall taste, bubble quality, the sound the can makes when ya snap the tab, “is this really a seltzer?”, “is the flavor what is says it is?” and general commentary about packaging. for the flavors with representation from multiple brands (lime, lemon, grapefruit, black cherry) we did a blind taste test – one friend poured for the other and we had to guess the brand. nothing scientific, but here goes!
the FULL lineup!!
category: fun fruits!
full transparency: mango
aditi: 5/10
emma T: 2.5/10
emma D: 5/10
full transparency is brewed by DC Brau, a local brewery. Emma T was truly nottt a fan of this one – the flavor doesn’t exactly match the smell. we wanted it to be more of a mango juice based on first whiff but it just wasn’t hitting that spot.
white claw: raspberry
aditi: 8/10
emma T: 7/10
emma D: 5/10
honestly classic. not much commentary to be made here.
full transparency: raspberry limeade
aditi: 5/10
emma T: 6/10
emma D: 3/10
“harder than expected for sure” was the only commentary I had written in my notes? but honestly i’m a hard no on this branding for full transparency. weird font, too many circles, not into it, 1/10.
full transparency: passionfruit orange guava
aditi: 4/10
emma T: 6/10
emma D: 4.5/10
Emma T is a big POG fan (pomegranate, orange, guava) but I was pretty meh on this. controversial opinions on the flavor itself – but decidedly flat on the bubbles.
category: black cherry
full transparency: black cherry
aditi: 5/10
emma T: 4/10
emma D: 3/10
common theme with the full transparency seltzers is a really strong smell – while the white claws/trulys had virtually no smell. don’t know if thats good or bad – but it feels more like drinking juice and caused a little dissonance between what we thought we were going to get and what we actually got.
white claw: black cherry
aditi: 5/10
emma T: 5/10
emma D: 6/10
very clean tasting – no smell. black cherry somehow does taste better than normal cherry flavoring. like a grownup cherry candy. approve!
category: various citrus
stillwater: electric yuzu
aditi: 7/10
emma T: 7/10
emma D: 7/10
very kombucha-like. if you’re into kombucha you’ll like this – however, the liquid wasn’t clear like most hard seltzers. stillwater classifies this a seltzer but this for sippin’ with your hipster beer friends, not for a party pregame chug.
stillwater: citrus haze
aditi: 8/10
emma T: 5/10
emma D: 7/10
I’m really a sucker for a holographic label and by now you know I love a kombucha – so me and Emma D the #beerlovers liked this. citrus haze was even more beer-like than electric yuzu, hence higher ratings. again, stillwater’s “seltzers” are really encroaching into beer territory – so not for everyone.
full transparency: orange crush
aditi: 4.5/10
emma T: 5.25/10
emma D: 3/10
truly: lemon
aditi: 5/10
emma T: 3/10
emma D: ??
we put this against both the lime flavors in a blind test, its a lemon! this was 3/4 of the way through the afternoon and accurate ratings were becoming less of a priority!
truly: lime
aditi: 5/10
emma T: 1/10
emma D: 4/10
emma T back with the strong no! just was a little on the fake side for us generally.
category: grapefruit
truly: grapefruit
aditi: 7.5/10
emma T: 6/10
emma D: ?
not going to lie – this was at the tail end of our hard seltzer journey so…no significant commentary and sloppy on the ratings collection. grapefruit arguably amongst the better flavors here.
white claw: grapefruit
aditi: 6/10
emma T: 5/10
emma D: ??
honestly – the end.
overall thoughts here:
- full transparency flavors had strong smells that sometimes didn’t match up to the taste
- truly and white claw are not all that dissimilar
- stillwater artisanal is delicious kombucha trying to be a white claw
- this was not a scientific study but next time i’d like to do standard blind tests across flavors
try this at home and let us know what your ratings are, and huge thanks to my friends for participating in this ridiculous activity with me!
aditi eats 