Another Booze Taste-Test

The question we are answering in this taste test is: does a ¥105 can of happoushu (synthetic beer-flavored drink) taste noticably better than an ¥88 can?

Introduction

Left to right: Koiaji deluxe, Nodogoshi nama, Kirameki mugi

Name (Japanese script)	Name (romanized)	Name (translated)	Price (¥)
濃い味デラックス	Koiaji delakkusu	Luxury strong taste	105
のどごし＜生＞	Nodogoshi (nama)	Refreshing throat feel (raw)	88
煌き麦	Kirameki mugi	Shining barley	105

Method

As before, we sampled them blind, only checking the names (and prices!) after we'd written down our conclusions. We conducted the taste test as three pairwise comparisons.

Results

Koiaji delakkusu vs Nodogoshi (nama)

Koiaji delakkusu tasted like real beer. The watery Nodogoshi (name) tasted more like soda.

Koiaji delakkusu vs Kirameki mugi

Difficult to choose between them. Peter slightly preferred the hoppier Koiaji delakkusu over the fruitier Kirameki mugi, but Chisako judged them about the same.

Nodogoshi (nama) vs Kirameki mugi

The Nodogoshi (nama) had a dry, but noticably weaker flavor. Kirameki mugi was the superior of the two.

Conclusions

These three samples suggest that you get what you pay for - the ¥17 (19%) price increment made a big difference in flavor. However, there are many other brands to try, and more research is needed.