My daughters just got back from a 10-day jaunt to the UK, and the youngest one reports that while in London, she had a bottle of a Marks & Spencer brand cola-flavored soda pop that, she says, had either malt or malt whiskey on its list of ingredients. She’s her mother’s daughter in that she’s a compulsive reader of lists of ingredients, but she’s her father’s daughter in that she doesn’t always pay a whole lot of attention to the information therein. So I’m mildly curious as to what exactly she read there. Malt syrup, perhaps? Or do they really sell whiskey-flavored cola at Marks & Spencer?
In the Mexican part of your grocery store you’ll find Malta, which is a malt beverage that isn’t alcoholic. It’s made with malt, though.
But is it cola-flavored, too? Or just malt-flavored?
It’s highly likely the ingredient is barley malt extract.
About a year ago another UK supermarket chain, viz. Sainsbury’s, replaced the colouring agent sulphite ammonia caramel in its cola with barley malt extract, in response to concerns from parents about the possible deleterious effects of artificial additives.
I’ll wager M&S have now followed suit.
Link.
Sainsbury’s cola is cola flavoured but I can’t vouch for the M&S cola.
Does it taste anything like a malted milk?
Isn’t a malted milk like a milkshake? Malta is… well, I guess it’s an acquired taste. It comes in little bottles and it’s kind of filling. I’m not crazy about it, but Himself is. I guess if you took the malty part of beer, made it sweeter, and took out all the hops and stuff, that’s what you’d get. Or, like, kind of like a Whopper without the chocolate, maybe.
One adds malted milk powder to a milk shake to get a classic american ‘malt’.
But malted milk powder is made from powdered milk and malt powder. Malt powder is dried germinated barley, ground fine.
I’m just wondering if Malta is made with malt powder, and if so, does it taste malty, like a concoction containing malted milk powder.
K, thanks, that makes sense. So it’s just another additive; I thought maybe it was some exotic UK soda pop taste treat, “Malted Cokes” or something.
I tried a malt-flavoured drink recently (not sure if it was Malta or some other brand - I bought it in the ‘ethnic’ aisle of my local Tesco store). It tasted very malty (it wasn’t nice), but not milky at all - it was like (well, not just like - it was) sickly sweet unfermented beer.
This isn’t what the OP is asking about though - and I expect if malt extract is present in M&S cola, it’s probably a minor component.
I can’t find an ingredient list online, but according to Wikipedia, "It is a carbonated malt beverage, meaning it is brewed from barley, hops, yeast, and water much like beer; corn and caramel color may also be added. " You can’t taste the hops at all - I’d agree with Wiki that there’s a distinct molasses taste. Wiki also says that Latin Americans drink it with milk sometimes - wonder what kind of bastard child of the “classic American malt” that would produce?
If you try some, trust me - get it REALLY COLD first.
Mmm! Sounds like Bupgoo!
