What’s the Best Seltzer? Exploring, Ranking The Best

December 8, 2017

We finally deliver one of the most requested episodes. Kyle Merber joins the CITIUS MAG Podcast to take all your listener questions. Thanks a lot to all of the listeners who sent in questions. We did our best to get to as many of them but definitely ran out of time and will have to bring Merber back on the show at another point.

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WHAT’S THE BEST SELTZER?

Kyle Merber: My former Columbia teammate, Mark Feigen, posted some rankings and I agree with him for the most part. My big ones would be from Stop N Shop. They have some wild good flavors. They’re very hoppy as I like to say. Spicy is another adjective that’s been thrown around to describe them. Vintage and Polar are your top two. I don’t think LaCroix is bad. Don’t get me wrong. It’s much better than flat water but I also think it’s an introductory seltzer. If you’re new to seltzer and don’t know where to start then that’s a good pathway to start.

Chris Chavez: What’s trash?

Merber: Oh just water. (Laughs) I don’t love Sodastream. Hot take. I don’t love it.

Chavez: You answered our next listener’s question who asks whether it’s better to go store brand over LaCroix. Well I guess it depends on the store.

Merber: Stop and Shop is three 12-packs for $8. So that’s 36 drinks for $8. We’re at less than a quarter for a seltzer. That’s a deal.

Chavez: That’s a steal.

Merber: Sometimes people are paying $5 for 12.

Chavez: How do you feel about Hal’s New York Seltzer.

Merber: Hal’s is good. That’s probably my favorite bottle.

Chavez: Because you have a thing against glass bottles after stepping in glass and getting injured?

Merber: No. Prefer canned seltzer. Seltzer is so interesting to me because we’re living in this microcosm. I don’t realize whether seltzer is just a trendy thing among me and my friends from New York. It’s definitely a New York and Northeast thing. Then, it’s really popular among runners because it’s a good alternative to soda. So I have this skewed idea that everyone in the world drinks seltzer because everyone I associate with is a Northeast runner. I just don’t know if the rest of the world has caught on yet.

Chavez: I visited a friend of mine who was still in college in Milwaukee and they had a fridge full of LaCroix.

Merber: See! They’re being introduced and starting slowly. They’ll get up to Polar.

Chavez: Listener Jacob Latonis wants to know how many seltzers per day for you. Please round to the nearest thousandth.

Merber: If I’m home for the whole day. Like if I wake up and run from the house or I’m spending the whole day here then I drink, honestly, like 8 seltzers in a day. I’ll do the very rare night seltz.

Chavez: I do those too. It’s better than snacking.

Merber: Where like it’s 3 a.m. and you’re going to the bathroom so you just go to take another sip.

Chavez: A 3 a.m. one? I haven’t heard of that one.

Merber: You just take a lil sip. It helps me sleep.

Kyle Merber

After hanging up his spikes – but never his running shoes – Kyle pivoted to the media side of things, where he shares his enthusiasm, insights, and experiences with subscribers of The Lap Count newsletter, as well as viewers of CITIUS MAG live shows.