Budweiser Chelada

It was way better than expected. Not quite a "red" beer. Color is similar to watermellon juice; kind of pink. Soda pop foam when poured with no head or lace. Very pronounced Clamato aroma - fishy and tomatoey.. Ditto with the flavor. Not that bad, though, really. Actually I like it much better than a shandy. Wonder how it’d be using a weiss beer as a base instead of macro lagar. The Clamato totally dominates the Bud. Got it at a quick mart in North Miami Beach. Has almost no beer character. As far as being a great beer, the can says "drink alone or as a mixer". Read into that as you wish.

Can courtesy of dragonstout at the Otown December tasting. Murky light pink pour. Very nice aroma of sweet tomato juice. Flavor was watered down tomato juice and black pepper. I actually preferred the bud light version!! THis one was too tart and ummm gross.

THOUGHTS: It didn’t really seem like beer at all. I can’t see why you would put lime and tomato together. Beer could go with either, but all three together are pretty bad. Also, carbonation and tomato juice don’t mix well. Why couldn’t this have been in a 8 oz. can instead of a 24 oz. one. Drinking this is like vomiting in reverse by the end of the can. You almost need a chaser to drink this one. By the way it also burns the belly. TECHNICAL: Can. Poured a muddy salmon color that was sort of like ruby red grapefruit juice but with more orange. It had a small to average, fizzy, pink head that fully diminished and left virtually no lacing, but there was residue left on the glass all the way down. The aroma was mostly tomato soup, underlying lime, salt and a slight bit of vomit. The initial flavor was light to moderately sweet, moderate to heavily acidic and very salty; while the finish was lightly sweet and acidic, and salty with an average duration. There was tomato soup up front then lemon-lime seltzer in the back. The spicy tongue burning aspect of the beer may have just been all the salt. The medium to full body was soupy with very fizzy carbonation and a spicy, salty and light astringent finish.

24 oz can split with a beer geek buddy of mine. We were in agreement, this stuff is just horrible. I got my whole portion down, he couldn’t get passed a few sips. Blahhh. Next

I can see this is getting pretty lousy ratings - so don’t throw things at me, please, but I liked it, and consider it to be one of Anheuser Busch’s best products. It is based on a Mexican way of enjoying beer. I have tried lagers before with hot sauce and lime and salt, without enjoying them very much, but the addition of clam juice and tomato makes it a lot better. The salmon-coral color gives it a look like soda pop or guava juice, and the head disappers immediately. There is a hint of tomato in the mainstream lager aroma. This is a salty, tomato dominated beverage that seems more like a Bloody Mary than a beer, but the flavor is surprisingly good - tomato sweetness and citrus plus a little hot sauce mixed with mild lager. The aftertaste is spicy with a touch of fish. This makes a nice change of pace brew.

I actually didnt hate this beer. But to be honest it would be better served in a small glass next to OJ and coffee while dining on some eggs. Not much beer flavor and a whole lot of clamatoe juice.

7/1/08 From 16oz can. I don’t really know how to take this, but I’d have to agree with other raters that reviewing this as a beer is a bad idea, both for you and the ";beer";. Think of the thinnest bloddy mary you can imagine with basically no spices and a spritzy carb texture, and I think you’ll have a pretty good idea if the flavor.

Looks like grapefuit juice, smells like V8, tastes awful. I’m not looking forward to Bud Light Chelada.