SipHRD ran roughly 15 trial recipes on the lychee flavour alone, rejecting ones that were too sweet, too florally, lacked flavour, or had a bitter aftertaste. Their bar was a not-too-sweet drink — "us being Asians one of the biggest compliments is saying this is not too sweet."
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The recipe was the bottleneck. Daniel says they "probably had 15 maybe trial ones with the litechi flavor alone," rejecting batches that were "too sweet," "too florally," that "just didn't have enough flavor," or had that "bitter aftertaste" you can "taste" in "a RTD or salty." The flavour brief came from a cultural insight: they found existing seltzers were either "too bland" (the flavour "gone" after the first sip) or "way too sweet," and "us being Asians one of the biggest compliments is saying this is not too sweet" — they wanted something their age group and "older a generation can enjoy" too. After finalising the recipe they changed the ingredient to "100% ly juice" to fit their branding.