Unpopular Opinion: Alcoholic Seltzers are better without the Seltzer

Up your seltzer game just in time for summer.

Okay, hear me out—you pop the top to a fresh new White Claw, or whatever your favorite alcoholic seltzer is, and take a sip. Sure, it’s refreshing and light, but the carbonation bites your tongue.  It’s not just you, enzymes in your mouth covert the carbon dioxide found in water into carbonic acid. The carbonic acid stimulates nerve receptors in your mouth that activate pain mechanisms that can feel like a stinging or biting sensation. While some people like this sensation, many people find it to be too intense to be enjoyable.  

I don’t drink much pop, but when I do, I’m one of the rare people that prefer it to be flat, except McDonald’s fountain Diet Coke, that shit is delicious. We drink a lot of slightly sweetened flavored seltzer water. While I’ll drink it normal, I sometimes like to open a can and let it sit for a day or two to get flat and then drink it. I’m not sure why, but it took me an embarrassingly long time to think to do it with a White Claw, and it was actually by accident.

I am the absolute last person that would ever have a use for a SodaStream, but I was gifted one last year. Karen doesn’t mind carbonated beverages so we figured we would give it a try. We went out and got flavor additives and made a few bottles.  I thought the flavors were great, but I told Karen I would like it better without the carbonization. I took a bottle just for me and left the cap off and waited for it to go flat. Yeah, I know… I’m a monster.  

One day I had an off-brand seltzer that wasn’t very good, I was struggling through it. It was supposed to be watermelon flavor, but the carbonation was so aggressive it overpowered whatever flavor may have been there. At some point, I abandoned it and it found its way back into the fridge. A few days later, I came home from work and was looking for something to drink. All I had were those miserable seltzers. I saw the open one and grabbed it, no sense in opening another one.  I took a sip, and to my amazement, it was actually pretty good.  It had been open long enough to go flat. Without the carbonization, I was able to taste and appreciate the watermelon flavor. I had to do a double take, surely this couldn’t be the same drink I had despised just days ago. Not only did I take another sip, but I was also able to take larger gulps than I normally would if it was still carbonated. There’s always been something about alcoholic seltzers that I can’t drink them as fast as I would some other alcoholic beverage.

I went to the fridge and opened every can and let them go flat. Normally, it would have taken me an eternity to finish that six-pack considering how offensive it tasted in its original form. Flat, it was gone in a few days. For the real test, I wanted to try it on ones that I actually enjoyed the taste of. I went out and got a pack of Truly Pineapple, one of my favorite flavors. I opened a can and let it sit overnight. The next day, I took it out of the fridge and took a sip. It tasted like a light, refreshing pineapple juice. Sure, the original was great, but flat, it was delicious. I opened the rest of the six-pack, let them sit in the fridge overnight, and waited for the second half of my life to begin.  I’m not saying I made the greatest discovery of the 21st century, I’ll let you be the judge.