Why You Should Skip Canned Cocktails Made With Citrus Juice

The drink aisle of your grocery store has received a bit of a makeover in recent years, holding everything from CBD-infused juices to sugar-free energy drinks. Something similar has happened in the beer and chilled wine coolers, too, with space being made for a rising category of new canned cocktails. But buying canned cocktails can feel like a gamble and there's an actual reason why — it has less to do with the category's recent emergence and more to do with a single ingredient: citrus juice.

If you haven't noticed, a lot of the canned cocktails that you find in store are carbonated. The intentions are pure, as carbonation acts as a preservative, which is important for a product intended to sit on a store shelf for weeks, if not months, before being consumed. But the problem comes when the fizzy drink is paired with real citrus juice (another oh-so common ingredient in canned cocktails), because the results can be detrimental to the drinking experience. So much so you might want to add skipping canned cocktails made with citrus juice to your list of tips for buying canned cocktails. Because carbonation limits the amount of oxygen within the drink, the combination of bubbles and citrus juice poses an increased probability of oxidation to occur. The result? Off-tasting, bitter, and even soapy flavors that only get worse the longer those cans sit.

Knowing that citrus juice only tastes less good the longer it sits, and is made worse by the likelihood of oxidation when combined with carbonation, our advice is to avoid canned cocktails with fruit juice when possible, and avoid carbonated cocktails with fruit juice completely. Obviously, fresh fruit juice is king in fresh cocktail preparations. But when it comes to cans, the potential for funky flavors far outweighs the chances of fresh flavors.

While that might mean you'll need to avoid some fruit-forward drinks, there are certain canned cocktail brands that do taste pretty good. Our favorite Betty Booze flavor, Sparkling Bourbon with Apple Ginger Sour Cherry, seems to have mastered the art of combining bubbles with fruity flavors. How? By opting for waterless fruit concentrates over juice which have a stronger flavor and also inhibit the chances for bacteria growth. That's something to look out for when you're shopping. Or look for something like cans of Tip Top Proper cocktails, which are the canned cocktails our taste testers ranked the best, as they are are fruity, fresh, and, crucially, not carbonated. 

All in all, you may still need to do some taste-testing to find your favorite canned cocktail, but if you check labels carefully, you should be steered in the right direction tastewise, and will hopefully avoid bitterness and disappointment. A simple rule to remember is that you can either go bubbly, or fruity, but if you decide to go both, know you might be met with some off-putting flavors.