It Tastes Just Like Chicken

Greetings,

“Close your eyes… take a sip and you won’t be able to tell the difference.”

The brand manager was telling me why the fact that his beer, with as much color as a glass of New York City water, was a good beer to drink.

He was right.

Miller Clear Beer tasted just like Miller High Life but without the color.

My question to him was… “Who drinks beer with their eyes closed?”

He had no answer.

This brings me to the observation that although a “beer” can look like many things it should not actually look like water. Water should not taste like the food chemists idea of lemon, lime, cherry or orange. Water should taste like water.

What does water taste like?

Actually there are probably as many “flavors” to water as there are water systems in whatever country, province, state, town or village the water comes from. There is “hard” water, with minerals dissolved in the trip to the surface of the earth, usually a natural spring. However, there are parts of the world where the spring water is saltier or picks up other minerals on the trip from the well to your tap. Of course there are the odors and flavors that water treatment plants add to the ideally “tasteless” beverage.

All of this understood; if the water is ice cold and quaffed with gusto there should be no doubt that it is water you are drinking. If there are flavors they should be trace flavors and not obvious… water should be water.

This brings me back to the Miller Clear Beer.

Yes, it was brewed as a beer is brewed it did not look like a beer.

It looked like water. Eyes wide open, I was expecting water. What I got was what passes for the house-flavors of Miller High Life.

I was confused and my taste buds were also.

When it comes to flavor experiences, any confusion is bad.

It leads to misunderstandings and the next time someone tells you that “It tastes just like chicken.”…


You will never believe them.