I consumed Cheeky on a stunning Saturday evening in Dunedin. The refreshing iced tea combined with the thirsty summer weather quickly saw me near the bottom of my box. Cheeky Hard Iced Tea is an instant classic. It has simple packaging and it’s a simple idea, but it’s well-executed.
The merger of tea and alcohol is a beautiful thing. In Ancient China, the only way people could get by without dying of some terrible disease was by sterilising their water by boiling it into tea. In Medieval Europe, the only way people could get by without dying of some terrible disease was by sterilising their water by brewing it into alcohol. Alcoholic Iced Tea is a combination of these two ideas. Because we live in the age of covid, I therefore believe it to be one of the safest drinks on the market — in fact, practically a preventative health tonic.
I found it hard to adjust to the taste on my first can. I’m not used to drinking non-fizzy drinks that taste nice (@wine). As I adjusted to the taste they just kept getting better and better. It was a dangerous game. The lemon and tea flavours pair better than OUSA and incompetence. Cheekys are not overly sweet, so drinking a lot of them is not a problem. Somehow each sip felt more refreshing, even though I was well into the box. Each can was a well-deserved reward, despite the fact that I had achieved nothing that week other than barely passing my summer-school exams.
Unlike most drinks, you can justifiably serve tea flat. This means Cheekys can be easily deleted without yakking them all over your bathroom floor two minutes later. They remained drinkable for the whole night and I never once felt put off by the thought of taking another sip. This is a huge achievement for any drink. These are possibly the most funnel-able drinks I’ve ever encountered.
Cheekys clock in at 6% ABV. There are ten 330 mL cans to a box, and they are 1.6 standards each. They go for $27 at Henry’s Centre City which puts them at a steep 1.7 dollars per standard. That isn’t great, but it is pretty standard for RTDs and it would improve on sale. The golden ratio is becoming impossible to reach anyway. Even the mighty goon is struggling to reach a dollar per standard nowadays.
Cheeky Hard Iced Tea is incredibly drinkable. It’s light, like Part-Time Rangers, but it doesn’t become increasingly acidic and tasteless with each sip. The concept of the drink is also brilliant. It’s an obvious step to mix tea and alcohol, yet there is no other drink on the market like it. They’re a local company which started out at the Uni so it's great to support them. In the already saturated market of RTDs, Cheeky Iced Tea is a nicer change than the University getting rid of Harlene.