Soft drinks are sickly sweet.
Diet soft drinks are not sweet, and even leave a bitter aftertaste.
Why does it have to be “all or nothing”?
Regular soft drinks are made of about 25% sugar. Diet drinks are 0% sugar.
Why not make a carbonated drink that is, say 1% , or 5% sugar?
One teaspoon’s worth of sugar works fine in a glass of tea or coffee.
Why not in diet soft drinks?
[ul]
[li]Pepsi Next[/li][li]Dr Pepper 10[/li][li]Coca-Cola C2 (discontinued)[/li][/ul]
There’s a drink like that but I don’t remember the name and it’s not a carbonated soft drink.
Diet drinks are sweet for most people, though there seems to be some differences between people in how they sense no-calorie sweeteners.
There are some products on the market that try to meet in the middle. Pepsi Next comes to mind (2/3s the suger). Dr. Pepper has a 10-calorie version. Crystal Light has about 5 calories per serving because of a small amount of caloric sweetener. Snapple and some other tea brands have options that are lightly sweetened. There are many powdered products (like Kool-Aid) that let you add water and sugar to come up with the concentration you like best.
Since most of these are marginal products (compared to the biggest sellers), I have to assume that it’s the market speaking.
As noted, there are increasing number of “low calorie” options available.
The problem with many of these, IMHO, is that when you’re a fan of sugary soda, if it’s a choice between a lousy-tasting low calorie option and a lousy-tasting no calorie option, then why not choose the no-calorie option?
I tend not to drink as many soft drinks as I used to, and when I need my caffeine fix I tend to grab a sugar-free Red Bull (tastes just as bad as regular Red Bull! ;-). But again, IME/personal opinion, few of the “low cal” soft drinks improve enough on their no-calorie diet counterparts to make it worth grabbing them instead of the diet.
I don’t know about other people - to me, fake sweetners simply do not mix with sugar, it’s either one or the other. If I have something with real sugar, the residue of aspertame just has an awful lingering taste.
A lot of soft drinks ARE like that although as far as I know they are not marketed that way. Fanta in the UK is one, which is the main reason I don’t drink it. Similarly it’s very difficult to get lemonade here without some artificial sweetner somewhere.
I guess the thing is - what’s the point? Once you’ve put some artificial sweetner in you’ve ruined the taste, so why have any unhealthy sugar at all?
Do artificial sweeteners really taste that bad to some people? You could give me a cup of Coke and I wouldn’t even notice or care whether it was Diet or regular - especially if it was at the ultra-chilled temperature with tons of ice that a lot of fast-food places serve it at.
Oh yes. There is no hiding it. The after taste can linger for hours after one small sip. I have tried the popular zero-cal sodas, but they all taste horrible to me. Funny enough, iced tea with sweet and low added at the time of drinking is usually fine - but not always.
Back when I drank sugared soda, yup, diet soda tasted terrible to me. I’d try it from time to time (either because regular soda wasn’t available, or because I thought to myself, “might not be a bad idea to cut some calories”), but I’d always turn my nose up at it.
Then, I was diagnosed with diabetes, and cut out regular soda “cold turkey”. I got used to the taste of diet soda within a few days (weeks at the most), and now, it tastes just fine to me. 
Mitch Hedberg once said if you wear dentures and drink too much artificial sweetener, be careful. You might get a fake cavity.
I’ve wished for a while that soda manufacturers, rather than try to make a hybrid sugar/artificial sweetener mix, just make a soda that has 2/3 of the sugar to begin with.
It would take me maybe 2 weeks to get used to, but then I would be totally pleased with a soda that has 27-30g of sugar, rather than 40-45 grams.
I’m in the same camp.
When I drink soda, I prefer to pour it warm over ice, so I’m diluting it substantially.
Whenever I have things I can mix water with a powder (Kool-Aid, Crystal Light, etc.) I usually dilute it as well. Ocean Spray makes a cranberry drink mix that comes in a packet designed for a 16-20 oz bottle. I wind up diluting that into a half gallon (4 times as much water as the instructions) to make it taste like anything but syrup.
Pretty sure you can’t say that about everyone, maybe just yourself. I love diet drinks in all cases over regular soda. They are plenty sweet enough.
Aspartame does, the aftertaste rather than the taste itself.
Some of the other ones are not as bad, but they don’t compare to the rael thing.
I don’t notice any aftertaste from Aspartame or any of the other sweeteners, so a lo-cal version would have no appeal to me.
I rarely drink soft drinks, but my wife loves Diet Coke. I’ve tried it and it absolutely tastes like a science experiment gone bad to me. I could probably choke one down if I had to.
I’m sure the taste of artificial sweeters varies. The taste of things like cucumbers varies dramatically with a single gene: if you have the normal version, cukes are mild and pleasant. If you have the other version, they have a very distinct and disagreable flavor. I’m glad I’m in the former category!
Artifically sweetened sodas taste sweet to me, but with a mildly annoying aftertaste. If I had to diet, I’d drink them occasionally.
As it is, I switched from buing any kind of sodapop to stocking soda water – whatever’s cheapest, provided it’s low sodium. At first it wasn’t as satisfying as a soda, but now I think I enjoy them even more. And every now and then I get a sweet soda as a treat.
Now, if only I could find a sugar-free (but not artificially sweetened) substitute for chocolate, I’d be set. Oh wait, there’s also fat, and fried foods, and grilled foods, and … oh hell something’s gonna kill me no matter what.
Indeed. Taste varies between people. Meaning the actual sensation, not the idea of what one should like. My wife drinks diet coke and regular interchangeably, but can’t drink anything with a high alcohol content. Go figure.
I drink diet soft drinks almost exclusively now but, yeah, there’s a difference between Diet Coke and regular Coke. Regular Coke, to me, has a sweeter, stickier taste and feel to it. It also seems to be ever-so-slightly more viscous, but that could be my imagination. I prefer Diet Coke to regular Coke nowadays. It just has a “drier” taste and doesn’t leave my lips sticky after drinking.