After years of Diet Coke, Coke Zero was a happy surprise. It’s probably my favorite carbonated beverage these days.
But there seems to be an oddity with it - with Diet Coke, I pretty much ignored expiration dates. By a case, keep it in the garage, six months later it still tastes exactly the same.
Coke Zero on the other hand - man, I know when it has turned. It’s not really like it spoils - it’s too acidic I’m sure to do that. But it loses its sweetness, almost completely. And then tastes bad.
I’m to the point where I won’t even buy a 12-pack unless the expiry date is like two months off. It just is so nasty once the sweetness goes.
I hadn’t noticed that I had noticed, but now that you mention it, looking back, yeah, I’ve noticed.
Temperature is very important as well. Coke Zero must be frigid in order to be delicious. Slightly less cold and it drops down to undrinkable pretty fast.
Since we’re talking about the drinkability of Coca-Cola products…
Why does the Diet Coke at McDonalds taste like crap? From Knoxville, to San Antonio, to Atlanta, to Minneapolis, this seemingly holds true. Oh, not at ALL of them of course, but at the large majority of them (especially in stand-alone restaurants), the Diet Coke tastes like crap. Why?
I never noticed, but I probably drink it up too soon for it to turn.
I reckon that the diet coke at McDonald’s tastes awful because fountain pop generally taste awful. I’ve noticed that the fountain pop at McDonald’s is only any good as an accompaniment to their food. If you just order a fountain drink of any kind, I doubt you’ll enjoy it.
I haven’t encountered either problem. I usually don’t have pop around long enough to ever even notice expiration dates, and certainly have never noticed anything about Coke Zero going bad.
Furthermore, so long as it’s in cans, Coke Zero is fine even at near room temperature. But I find that to be the case with a lot of pop.
As for Diet Coke at McD’s tasting like crap, well, that’s just because it’s Diet Coke. Horrible horrible substance, Diet Coke, about the only thing worse is Diet Pepsi. I’ve never been able to drink either of those two, even though I drink plenty of other diet pop. Even things like Diet Cherry Coke or Diet Pepsi with Lime are fine by me, but regular Diet Coke or Diet Pepsi, blarrrgh. Of course one of those two is the only choice for diet at 99.9% of restaurants…:mad:
Fountain pop is dirt cheap so it’s a huge money maker. I reckon the proportion is wrong and usually when it’s something like that it’s a way to inflat profits even more.
Semi-related hijack, but what happened to the 2-litre bottles of Diet Coke with Splenda? I go long periods between craving carbonation, so last I checked was maybe a year, year and a half ago, when I got 2-litres fairly often. Now it can be challenging to find it at all, even in cans – which to my mind is a waste of packaging since I’ll be pouring it in a glass anyway.
Coke Zero is good on its own merits, but Diet-with-Splenda is the closest I’ve tasted to the real fully-sugared Coke.
Of course, which is why I said it was good on its own merits.
Coke Zero has a sharper “bite” to it. Diet with Splenda is milder and more full-bodied, like regular sugared Coke. (Diet with aspertame is just nasty.)
There are times when I’m in the mood for “bite” in which Coke Zero is the drink of choice, but when I want something close to sugared Coke, I either have to deal with the sugar (which I do, but rarely), or drink the Splenda version. But it’s been impossible to find the Splenda version in 2-litres for months, and it’s even getting harder to find them in cans. I’m wondering if they’ve stopped producing them or what?
I agree with Max the Immortal. I cannot stand fountain soft drinks. Anywhere. I just chalk it up to the Quality Control at the Bottling plant is more precise than the minimum wage kid in the back of the restaurant.
It’s surprising to me that you think splenda diet coke tastes more like coke than coke zero. I love coke zero exactly because it tastes, to me, so much like coke, while diet coke (splenda or not) does not.
But tongues differ. I’m not sure I taste the “bite” you referred to, for example.
I never stockpile the stuff, so I haven’t noticed it going "off’ before opening…but I have noticed that half-empty cans go bad fater than half-empty cans of Pepsi Max. I mean forgotten cans that are sitting around open at room temperature. The Coke Zero ones get clumpy and moldy while the pepsi or Sprite don’t…my son tends to forget to dump out his cans when he’s done…
Number one, I have always found that fountain sodas are slightly more sweet than regular sodas. That is generally why everyone loves fountains so much. On the rare occasion that they are less sweet, they are always WAY less sweet which means they are running out of syrup.
Secondly, I still cannot understand why people would drink diet soda. If you are that fat or diabetic that you cannot drink regular soda, then just stop drinking soda! Its not that hard people. If you need something carbonated go drink some seltzer. Why would you want the dry aftertase of diet sodas anyways? I would rather drink iced tea or juice than a diet soda anyday.
I can’t stand seltzer or carbonated water, for what it’s worth. I like the taste of some diet sodas. I actually prefer Crystal Light (iced tea or peach tea or lemonade) to either of them, but that’s more expensive so I can’t afford to make it my constant default.
I just wanted to note that it figures that Pepsi would bring out the Throwback (Pepsi with sugar instead of HFCS) right when I’m trying to get a handle on my diabetes. Damn timing…
I’ve noticed the same thing with Diet Coke at McDonald’s. To me it is consistently (across locations and time) undercarbonated and so somewhat flat. Kind of like bar Coke. This does not seem to be true of fountains in other places but is so consistent across McDonald’s locations I’ve always assumed it must be “policy” in some way.
Other sodas from the same fountain do not have the same issue that I’ve ever noticed.