RTD

The one thing every can here has in common is that the mixing has already happened. Inside that, the format stretches from a gin and tonic built roughly the way a bar would build it, through a lightly flavoured seltzer, to a sweet fruit cooler that tastes almost nothing like either of them. Style, strength and sugar level vary widely between them. The category name tells you how a drink was packaged and nothing whatsoever about how it will taste.

Some of these are made with a genuine distilled spirit. Others use a fermented base or a wine base, which is a different product built to a different specification, and the back of the can normally says which one you are holding. The base changes the flavour sitting underneath the fruit: spirit-based drinks tend to taste cleaner and drier, while fermented bases carry a slight sweetness of their own that shows through the flavouring. It is one of the more useful lines on the label.

A hard seltzer is carbonated water with an alcohol base and a light flavouring, and it reached South African shelves relatively recently. The appeal is that it tastes of very little: a suggestion of lime or berry over bubbles, with none of the malt of a beer and none of the syrup of a cooler. That restraint is the point rather than a compromise. Sugar content still varies a good deal between brands, so the panel on the back is worth a look.

That depends entirely on the can, and the two numbers you need are both printed on it: the alcohol by volume percentage and the volume in millilitres. A large can at a low percentage and a small can at a high one can hold the same amount of alcohol.

No. These are finished as sold, which is the point of the format. Pouring one over ice into a glass changes the experience more than any addition would, opening up the aroma and slowing the pace compared with drinking from the can. Citrus is the only garnish most want.

Cold, upright and out of the light. Citrus and fruit flavourings fade faster than people expect and heat accelerates it, so a can left in a warm car boot for a month will taste duller than a fresh one. Cans block light completely; clear bottles do not.