I've only seen it in large supermarkets, in 2L bottles. The label's similar to the normal Diet Coke one but it's a gold colour; easy to tell apart from "standard". You still get Diet Coke, and they're usually next to each other on the shelves. Anyone else seen it around?
I shall have a hunt at my local supermarkets in Tescotown. I don't think I've ever seen it before though, odd considering how many supermarkets we have here.
For the record, I think Diet Coke tastes awful, but there we go. 'round here the caffeine-free stuff disappears from the supermarkets so fast they can't stock it quickly enough.
Nothin' quite like stopping by Sonic on Friday night to get a 44oz Cherry Vanilla Coke. My bladder hates me, but my taste buds rejoice. -monkey
I stand by the amazingness of Vanilla Coke. Not that diet s***, it tastes nasty. I wonder why they discontinued it.
diet caffeine free wuss. Cherry coke and dr pepper are legendary fizzy drinks there isnt much that compares imo. Everyone i know who likes vanilla coke drank it because it tasted like cream soda. I like cream soda but dont like vanilla coke iznt zat vierd????
and the fact that coke zero is very bad for you! because of the sweetener used. it is worse for you than normal coke. and coke zero tastes manky! even worse than diet coke.
That's absolute rubbish. There's a whole load of nonsense circulating the web about Aspartame being an evil child-killer because its made from amino acids and causes low levels of methanal/formaldehyde to be formed in the body, but people who point this out fail to realise that drinking fruit juice causes considerably more methanal to be formed in the body than drinking a diet soft drink does. It's all within totaly safe limits. Now contrast this with sugar which actually requires nutrients in order to be counteracted by the body - in effect an anti-nutrient - and which rots your muscle tissue as well as your teeth, screws with your blood sugar and insulin levels, and makes you fat and hyper, aspartame is super duper. The only people who should be remotely worried about the artificial sweeteners used in soft drinks are those suffering clinical depression, and even then its only people taking ridiculously large quantities of it (in excess of 6 litres of diet soft drinks a day, or more) that need to be considering taking less.
Aspartame is not great: animo acids and a benzene ring, WOOO. It won't give you cancer because it's a substituted ring but it's not good to load ones system up with artificial products. Both my old housemate and I get headaches from this fake sugar so I try to avoid it at all costs. Sugar is a natural product that is dealt with the body like anything else for hundreds of thousands of years, and in moderation is perfectly fine. It's what you have developed insulin and enzymes for: keep the body doing what it's designed for and nothing will stop working or slow down.
Regardless, the only real arguement against aspartame that can be applied to everyone (as opposed to those who are alergic or people like you who develop headaches, perhaps the same thing) is that it causes methanal to be formed, and as I pointed out fruit juice causes considerably more to be formed.
Dairy products have plenty of phenylalanine, an amino acid with a substituted benzene ring. Fruit juices are preserved with benzoic acid. Resveratrol (a polyphenol) is extremely beneficial for the body. There's plenty of such compounds around, but last time I checked the studies on the carcinogenic potential of aspartame were either in disagreement or inconclusive, so there's no solid evidence either way. (besides, methanal smells nice)
But that's besides the point: other natural products have been around for years and our bodies are conditioned over many years of evolution to cope with them specifically: enzymatic response is very specific to certain things and the by-products of artificially introduced chemicals can possibly be broken down in a variety of unforseen ways as it passes through the body, or even our diverse and non-uniform bacteria array may get a hold of and do something naughty with? It's not that I'm totally against it because no one's died and it doesn't have serious effects and I'm not "OMFG Organic or I'm not touching it" but I do try to limit the **** that goes in I mean, I say all this and still drink Coke occasionally: Phosphoric Acid, a ton of colours, sugar, caffiene and "vegetable extracts". If that isn't abusing my body, what is? Fruit Juices may also do it but it's not just about the methanal, it's the process of excreting other by products which some people aren't capable of or other processes. Fruit contains saccarides and fructose which is a sugar derivative which requires another process of work again.
So, as a question, what is it about the two amino acids in aspartame that you're suggesting is hard for the body to deal with?
