Gwynedd Stuart
Okay, I might not have been the best person to set out to find the best Twisted Tea flavors. Why? Well, I firmly believe that hard tea should taste like tea, and I don’t think Twisted Tea pulls it off all that well, despite it being the most prominent hard tea brand in the U.S. But also…I kind of am the best person to find the best Twisted Tea flavors, because I’ve taste tested pretty much every brand of hard tea (on camera and off) and in some professional-food-taste-testing circles, I suppose that makes me an expert on the subject.
What we were looking for in the best Twisted Tea flavors
At risk of beating a dead horse with a gigantic can of alcoholic liquid, hard tea should taste like iced tea—refreshing, nostalgic, a little tannic even. I gravitated toward the Twisted Tea flavors that taste the most like tea and the least like artificial fruit flavors that overpower everything else. One nice thing I can say about Twisted Tea: The drinks are non-carbonated, which does help to make them more iced tea-like. I have almost no use for sparkling hard tea.
I recently sat down at my desk with seven cans of Twisted Tea (aka every Twisted Tea flavor we could reasonably find) and tasted them one by one. Here’s how things shook out:
- Mangonada
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I’m not even sure why this Twisted Tea flavor exists. A mangonada—a zesty frozen drink laced with chamoy that’s typically served in a glass rimmed with Tajin—has enough going on. There’s no room for tea in the mix, so why would Twisted Tea even try? All in all, this just tastes cloying, phony, and bad.
Credit: Liv Averett / Twisted Tea
- Raspberry
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If you’re a fan of Snapple Raspberry Tea and you don’t mind if the tea part of the equation is even more muted, then, hey, maybe this is the best Twisted Tea flavor for you. It’s certainly not terrible, but there are fruit flavored options that taste a little less medicinal.
Credit: Liv Averett / Twisted Tea
- Peach
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At one point this was the best peach hard tea in our ranking, but then High Noon hard tea came along and knocked it off its pedestal. C’est la vie! It’s a little fake-y tasting, but still pleasant enough. Downing a whole can might be a challenge, but there are worse things to drink at a ballgame or the beach.
Credit: Liv Averett / Twisted Tea
- Half & Half
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Twisted Tea Half & Half, which is their take on an Arnold Palmer, is almost good. If you’ve never had real tea or real lemonade and were raised in a bunker where you only had access to Lipton Brisk tea for your whole life, you might even like this. But in my opinion it doesn’t taste different enough from the original to justify existing. Some more authentic lemonade flavor would go a long way.
Credit: Liv Averett / Twisted Tea
- Original
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OG Twisted Tea is not bad. It’s fine. On first sip, it even tastes like tea. But I always struggle to keep tasting tea as I sip, if that makes sense. After a while, you’re just sipping sweet, astringent fluid—and there’s a lot of it to get through!
Credit: Liv Averett / Twisted Tea
- Mango
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Not to be confused with Twisted Tea Mangonada, which is bad, Mango Twisted Tea is pretty pleasant. It mostly tastes like mango nectar, but if you aren’t a stickler for tea flavor like I am, it’s good.
Credit: Liv Averett / Twisted Tea
- Pineapple
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Not sure why, but of all the Twisted Tea flavors I tried, this was the one that tasted the most like tea. Something about the blend of flavors just works: pineapple juice and tea base are great complements. I never would have guessed pineapple was the best Twisted Tea flavor, but here we are!
Credit: Liv Averett / Twisted Tea
Twisted Tea!
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Twisted Tea!
Twisted Tea!
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Thoughts? Questions? Complete disagreement? Leave a comment!