I had no idea this was an issue until I found myself in a little Mexican grocery/restaurant, and they had a cooler full of Coke in glass bottles with "henco en Mexico" written on them. I had no idea what a treat I was in for when I popped the cap on this retro-style bottle. Upon my first sip, I knew this was something special. It tasted like Coke from my childhood. At first, I chocked it up to the glass bottle nostalgia. Then I read the ingredients. Not one mention of "high fructose corn syrup." Yes, that's right, Mexican Coke is made with cane sugar, just like they did for decades before the switch in the 1980s.
I don't even drink much Coke anymore. I drink diet sodas. But this was an experience I didn't think I'd ever have again. This really was the Real Thing. For you Pepsi drinkers out there, maybe you won't understand. If you weren't one of those really pissed people during the whole "New Coke" fiasco, you definitely won't understand. But a real Coke is a beautiful thing. I'm just glad I can have one again after 20+ years.
I had no idea. I am going to have to look for Mexican Coke. Thanks for the heads-up, Malik!
For awhile, I was trying to avoid processed sugars/sweeteners, so I was reading labels like crazy. I knew that the manufacturers had ginned up the taste of lowfat cookies and such by adding extra sugar (and sodium), but oh my goodness, the places I found high fructose corn syrup! Canned soups, for instance. And bottled spaghetti sauce. It's crazy.
EZ Board Survivor
"Dreaming isn't good for you unless you do the things it tells you to." -- Three Dog Night (via the GI)
you're more advanced than a cockroach,
have you ever tried explaining yourself
to one of them?
~ alan bates, the mothman prophecies
i've had this with actors before, on the set,
where they get upset about the [size of my]
trailer, and i'm always like...take my trailer,
cause... i'm from Kentucky
and that's not what we brag about.
~ george clooney, inside the actor's studio
a straight edge for legends at
the fold - searching for our
lost cities of gold. burnt tar,
gravel pits. sixteen gears switch.
Haphazard Lucy strolls by.
~ dennis r wood ~
War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.John Stuart Mill
While not as nostalgic as the glass bottled packaged Mexican Cokes, this is why I stock up on the Kosher for Passover 2 liter bottles of Coca-Cola every year. It is in the same packaging, including the lable. The only difference you can see is that it has a yellow cap instead of a red or black one that is usually on the 2 liters, and on the top of the cap is the words Kosher for Passover and some sort of rabbinical hehsher. For Jews of Ashkenazi descent, any corn product is not allowed for Passover, so the K4P Coke is also manufactured with cane sugar only, although the lable says otherwise.
I recently found the bottles of Mexican Coke in a small bodega here in Gator Town. We are awaiting our first Wal-Mart Super Center. I much prefer the Mexican Hellman's mayonnaise with lime instead of lemon that Wal-Mart sells in communities with a good sized Mexican population. I hope when our SuperCenter opens that I'll be able to find both products in their ethnic foods section.
I've spent a great deal of time in Mexican restaurants in this city, and I've never found anything like this. Maybe I'd have better luck if I was out of town. I'm definitely going to be on the lookout.
Malik23 wrote: For you Pepsi drinkers out there, maybe you won't understand.
Pepsi is like Coke's illegitimate, subnormal child. I have never understood the Pepsi craze.
“...The conversations had a nightmare flatness, talking dice spilled in the tube metal chairs, human aggregates disintegrating in cosmic inanity, random events in a dying universe where everything is exactly what it appears to be and no other relation than juxtaposition is possible.”
“There are two kinds of sufferers in this world: those who suffer from a lack of life, and those who suffer from an overabundance.”
I've only seen it in the Mexican groceries. Usually the grocery/cafe places automatically serve fountain Coke in the cafe, which would be the typical stuff sold everywhere. You would have to look in the cooler in the grocery section, and then ask if it could be served to you in the cafe area.
stormrider wrote:I've spent a great deal of time in Mexican restaurants in this city, and I've never found anything like this. Maybe I'd have better luck if I was out of town. I'm definitely going to be on the lookout.
Malik23 wrote: For you Pepsi drinkers out there, maybe you won't understand.
Pepsi is like Coke's illegitimate, subnormal child. I have never understood the Pepsi craze.
which city?
you're more advanced than a cockroach,
have you ever tried explaining yourself
to one of them?
~ alan bates, the mothman prophecies
i've had this with actors before, on the set,
where they get upset about the [size of my]
trailer, and i'm always like...take my trailer,
cause... i'm from Kentucky
and that's not what we brag about.
~ george clooney, inside the actor's studio
a straight edge for legends at
the fold - searching for our
lost cities of gold. burnt tar,
gravel pits. sixteen gears switch.
Haphazard Lucy strolls by.
~ dennis r wood ~
My understanding is that real Coke is sold everywhere else in the world. We're the only ones stuck with the HFCS.
I don't drink soda any more, but whenever I'm overseas I always have a Coke.....Reminds me of being a kid.
Malik's right, there ain't nothing like the real thing.
"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." - PJ O'Rourke
_____________
"Men and women range themselves into three classes or orders of intelligence; you can tell the lowest class by their habit of always talking about persons; the next by the fact that their habit is always to converse about things; the highest by their preference for the discussion of ideas." - Charles Stewart
_____________
"I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." - James Madison
_____________
Yeah, I was just gonna say that I'm pretty sure ours is made with regular cane sugar.
(Since we're on the topic, I hate Pepsi. And there's an interesting reason behind it...I never tasted a Pepsi until I was nearly 20. During apartheid, Pepsi was too ethical to continue trading with a sanctioned South Africa, and pulled out of the country. Coke stayed, and as a result, 2 generations of South Africans grew up only drinking coke. When Pepsi returned to South Africa after apartheid ended, the SA division was bankrupt within a couple of years. They couldn't sell it to the market. (I think they're back again now in one or two provinces...doubt anything will change.) )
I live in the latin district of S.F. and most of the resaurants and markets have the Mexican sodas in those thick refilled bottles. I rarely drink the stuff anymore but every once in a while I'll get a Squirt or Orange Crush with my flautas y chile rellenos. If you see it try the Sidral Mundet, it's apple soda, no caffiene.
"...and if you do not listen, then to hell with you."
I drink Pepsi almost exclusively (except when in restaurants where only Coke is served.) Today's Coke tastes bitter to me, but I'd love to try a Coke made with cane sugar.
Fricking corn huskers! Massive government subsidies to corporate farms leads to destruction of the individual farmer, overproduction of excessively cheap corn oil and corn syrup, unsustainable monocultures, overuse of pesticides and fertilizers made from petroleum products (some of them diverted for domestic terrorism): it all leads to fat cows and fatter people -- corn syrup in everything!! Now we have obesity and diabetis, which is exactly what the food and drug sellers want. All this wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that we are now going to switch to ethanol, which raises the price of all of the foregoing (to which we have become addicted psychologically, physically, and economically) which will require even greater inputs of energy and toxins and tax payer money to return a fuel that is less efficient and more corrisive than gasoline. Meanwhile, we grow more corn on more and more overstressed land driving out other healthier products and prohibiting reasonable population expansion into rural areas, even to the extent that the corn fields use up irreplaceable water resources and spewing them again into the air, changing the damn climate!! Oh well...guess I'll go eat some oatmeal with brown sugar in it...
Caedite omnes, Deus eius cognoverit.
~Pope Innocent III, said during the Albigensian Crusade (1209–29).
Menolly wrote:While not as nostalgic as the glass bottled packaged Mexican Cokes, this is why I stock up on the Kosher for Passover 2 liter bottles of Coca-Cola every year. It is in the same packaging, including the lable. The only difference you can see is that it has a yellow cap instead of a red or black one that is usually on the 2 liters, and on the top of the cap is the words Kosher for Passover and some sort of rabbinical hehsher. For Jews of Ashkenazi descent, any corn product is not allowed for Passover, so the K4P Coke is also manufactured with cane sugar only, although the lable says otherwise.
I recently found the bottles of Mexican Coke in a small bodega here in Gator Town. We are awaiting our first Wal-Mart Super Center. I much prefer the Mexican Hellman's mayonnaise with lime instead of lemon that Wal-Mart sells in communities with a good sized Mexican population. I hope when our SuperCenter opens that I'll be able to find both products in their ethnic foods section.
Was it in the little Hindu convenience store behind the Swamp restaurant off of NW 17th St?
Emotional Leper wrote:
Was it in the little Hindu convenience store behind the Swamp restaurant off of NW 17th St?
Welcome to my other responsibility on the Watch, EL!
Are you thinking of what is known as Haji-Mart among the less diverse minded students? With the talking parrot that says "Go Gators" in an Indian accent? Next door to Steamers, the "loose meat" sandwich shop?
Then...no. That's not it.
The place I'm thinking of is called La Tienda down on SW 13th Street. It's pretty much right next door to Waffle House.
*G-ds, it is so cool to talk local joints with a Watcher who knows where I'm taking about!!!*
I had no idea. I am going to have to look for Mexican Coke. Thanks for the heads-up, Malik!
