TasteBuddyCanada
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Does Coke taste better from a glass bottle?
Posted by Sandy McMurray on June 21, 2008 11:25 PM
When I turned on my radio this morning, the host was talking about the superiority of the Coca-Cola that's sold in glass bottles. He noted that some Americans are convinced that glass bottles improve the taste of Coke -- so convinced, he said, that they're willing to drive across the border to get so-called "Mexican Coke," which is still sold in small glass bottles.
As a veteran of this debate, let me say first of all that drinking Coke from a glass bottle is definitely a better experience than drinking Coke from a can or a cup. When you're hot and thirsty, it's refreshing to press cold glass against your lips, no matter what you're drinking. Bottles are good.
That said, the attraction of Mexican Coke is not just the glass bottle. It's the sugar. Coke sold in Mexico tastes different from "standard" American Coke because it's sweetened with sucrose (cane sugar or beet sugar) instead of fructose (corn syrup).
I was in high school when Coca-Cola was replaced by New Coke, then re-replaced by Coke Classic. This is where things went wrong, according to Coke aficionados and conspiracy theorists. Canadian Coke, sweetened with sugar, was replaced by a new formula Coke sweetened with high fructose corn syrup. And thus it has been ever since.
Why use corn sweeteners?
If sugar-sweetened Coke tastes better, why use high fructose corn syrup instead? The answer is money. Corn is subsidized and sugar has tariffs. It costs more -- a lot more -- to make Coke with sugar rather than corn sweetener, and many people can't tell the difference between the two.
There's another important difference between sucrose and fructose. Sugar is metabolized quickly, and makes you feel full sooner than corn sweetener.
In other words, you can drink more American Coke than Mexican Coke before feeling like you've had too much.
As long as this is true and as long as corn sweeteners are much cheaper than cane sugar or beet sugar, Coke and other companies will provide value to their shareholders by making a corny product.
Unless the biofuel craze drives up the price of corn. We can hope.
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