Radler Tournament - Becks

After our first radler round, tasting four Warsteiner beer mixes, we decided to test out 4 of the Beck's offerings.  Beck's is notable in the flavored beer category, not only because it seems to have more varieties widely available than anyone else, but also because its Green Lemon is one of the most popular beer mixes. Many good Bavarians will turn up their noses at the idea of a fruity beer mixed drink, but Beck's Green Lemon seems to be one of the firt and one of the more accepted ones out there.

In addition to its normal Pils beer assortment (we tasted Beck's and Beck's Gold in the Schnitzelbahn Beer Tournament), Beck's offers several flavored beers. Beck's Green Lemon was introduced in 2005, followed the next year by Chilled Orange and Level 7 (Guarana and lemongrass alcoholic energy drink). Then in 2008 came Beck's Ice, a mint and lime beverage that Beck's describes as having "filtered out the coloring of beer leaving the typical Beck's taste." 

We'll taste it in another round, but this year they're producing a "limited edition" Black Currant.

All of these are categorized as beer mixed drinks (Biermixgetränken), with 2.5% alcohol content. They also make a Beck's Lime, which at 4.9% alcohol content is described as "Real Beck's with a shot of lime." 

So, for this round we started with the Green Lemon, Lime, Ice, and Chilled Orange. Our biggest question before the tasting was "what's the difference between Green Lemon and Lime?" We did all the research after the tasting, so we could go into it without any prejudice. Therefore, we were unprepared for how different Green Lemon and Lime were. The Green Lemon tastes like beer, though a light one with a lime flavor. It's light, crisp, and sparkly and really enjoyable. A good mix, that isn't too sweet but retains the taste of beer.

The Lime tasted exactly as described - a real full beer, with a shot of lime... a very small hint of lime. While it's definitely a German pils, it reminds me of a Corona with lime. The lime softens the pils hoppiness and I think this would be a great beer with Mexican food. While we were pleasantly surprised by both, we preferred the smooth, light Green Lemon.  The Lime was good, but had a slight sour finish. Had we paired it with food, it might have beat its lighter brother. But for summer beer drinking, we'd choose the Green Lemon.

Then we had Beck's Ice Lime & Mint vs Beck's Chilled Orange. After the creamsicle-y Warsteiner Orange, we weren't sure what to expect. And we had no idea what to expect with the Lime & Mint. Well, Beck's Ice basically is Smirnoff Ice with less alcohol. There's no beer taste whatsoever.  I'd wouldn't be suprised if this one does well. Caipirinhas are quite popular here, and this is kind of a caipirinha-flavored drink. It's very smooth and easy to drink.

The Chilled Orange was also good, and had much more of a natural mandarin orange flavor, rather than the orange creamsicle sweetness of Warsteiner. We didn't love either of them, but we found the Chilled Orange to be more drinkable. The Ice probably is more popular, but it would be hard to drink much of it.

Not surprisingly, the Green Lemon then beat the Chilled Orange in the final of this preliminary round. We found the Green Lemon to be more in the spirit of a radler and the Orange has a slight artificial taste. Not bad, but we just prefered the smooth, not too sweet Green Lemon. 

Radler Tournament - Warsteiner

We've felt a little lost without a beer tournament, so we decided to test out the radlers, including the radler-style flavored beers. 

For the first competition, we tried four of Warsteiner's radlers: Radler, Grapefruit Radler, Lemon, and Orange.  

Since the Lemon and the Radler seemed closest, we matched them up for the first competition.   

We expected they would be quite similar, but were surprised with the outcome. The Radler, not surprisingly, has the classic radler taste of light, sweet, crisp, and with hints of beer and lemon-soda. The Lemon Warsteiner, on the other hand, tasted more like lemon flavor (rather than like Sprite), though it was not bitter.  It was not sweet, though, and we barely tasted the beer. 

We unanimously chose the Radler, since it was crisper and still maintained a little beer taste.

Next up were the Grapefruit Radler and the Orange. We really had no idea what to expect.  I was somehow surprised, though, to find that the Grapefruit had actual grapefruit taste, rather than some artificial flavor that was called "grapefruit." I love grapefruit juice and will eat them plain, but the grapefruit in my beer was just a little odd.  But, big points for authentic taste...it tastes exactly as described!

The Orange, on the other hand, had an orange taste that was closer to a sweet creamsicle-y orange rather than a citrus fruit. It was light and refreshing, and clean and sweet with the orange taste coming as a very light taste at the end. 

We wouldn't say the Grapefruit Radler is bad, but the Orange is much better and refreshing.

So, then we have a final taste-off for the first spot in the Radler Final Four (yes, this really is an abbreviated tournament!):  Warsteiner Radler vs Warsteiner Orange.

It was a really close call - both the Radler and the Orange tasted very similar at the beginning of each sip.  They were crisp, light, and refreshing.  But at the end of the sip, the tastes diverged.  The Radler had the classic Sprite taste and the Orange had a light creamsicle taste.  I just found the Orange to be more enjoyable tasting, but Herr J voted for it because he could still taste a little bit of beer in there.  And even though it is a flavored summer beer, he still wanted it to be a beer.

Next up, we'll taste some of Beck's many offerings and some classic Munich radlers.  We'll also compare bottled radlers to home-made.