I believe, but could be wrong, that the differentiating factor is that coke from Mexico is made with sugar.

Cane Sugar vs high-fructose corn syrup, yes. That's the conventional wisdom.

J. Kenji Lopez-Alt did a study where he concluded that people who think they like Mexican Coke more than Regular Coke simply enjoy tasting Coke out of a glass, and the perceived cane-sugar vs HFCS may just be a placebo:

https://www.seriouseats.com/coke-vs-mexican-coke

But YMMV. Even having read that study, I still prefer Mexican Coke.

Wait for Spring and find some yellow-capped 2L bottles of Coke. Those are Kosher for Passover so they don't contain any grain (corn), just cane sugar.

I would love to do a blind taste test. It could also be the aluminum can.

Even if a placebo, it's still true - I can't stand canned coke. I can't drink it, the taste to me is horrible.

If you had the energy to do so, you could try to replicate his results, i.e. buy a Mexican Coke, an American Glass Coke, and an American Can Coke, and decant them all into glasses or cups at home, then see if you can taste the difference.

If all your brain/tongue perceives as horrible is the taste of the aluminum can, you could always switch to buying Coke in glass bottles, which are more expensive than cans but still cheaper to buy in bulk than Mexican Cokes, and can be found at most grocery stores.

Or, if being limited to Mexican Coke means it reduces your overall soda consumption because you're only able to drink it when you're near a Home Depot, keep doing what you're doing. You'll probably be healthier for it.

> If all your brain/tongue perceives as horrible is the taste of the aluminum can, you could always switch to buying Coke in glass bottles

Or just pour it in a glass?

That would be a different test, methinks?

You're assuming that the taste is only affected by what it's being served in, not how the liquid was transported. For all we know, aluminum imparts some sort of off-flavor into the Coke itself that the OP doesn't like, in which case it wouldn't matter if he decants it into a glass first--it would already have been "tainted" by being held in the aluminum can.

It may again be placebo effect, but I can still taste the difference in bottled water poured into my steel water bottle and my usual filtered tap water.

I also can't stand plastic bottled sodas, and can tell they've been sitting in one even if drank out of something else after opening.

I fear the bottling/canning process and length of time spent in it gives it a bit of a whiskey-barrel style finishing taste alteration.

Also need to add McDonald's fountain Coke for sake of science.

Most soda is too sweet for me. I really enjoyed Club Mate, quite a bit more refreshing and way less sweet than Coca-Cola.

> way less sweet than Coca-Cola.

And twice as much caffeine per ml.

Exactly, it's the engineer's cola

I learned/realized recently it's only because of the US's deeply entrentched subsidies on corn that allows for HFCS to be cheaper than sugar and why it's so heavily used in processed foods.

Same with ethanol gas. If not for the corn subsidies, it wouldn't be cheaper. Also much more gas is burned growing/harvesting the corn and electrical powering the process than is saved in emissions (there was a great piece on HN of this some time ago), so it's a net negative to the environment. It's so dumb it hurts, but Iowa is an early presidential election state, so good luck finding someone who will go in and tell those early voters that they're gonna slow the gravy train...

The actual reason we stay on ethanol as a fuel additive is not about saving the planet: It's simply a good octane booster for the kinds of reliable octane you need in modern engines. Before, we had leaded gas which is bad, then MTBE which kept poisoning water tables.

In contrast, using 15% ethanol uses 15% less gas at a time when we were desperately trying to not be held by the balls by the middle east gas sellers, it's trivial to produce at scale, it was a simple handout to corn growers, which the US cares deeply about, and refineries didn't mind that it reduced the energy density of fuel by a couple percent, requiring you buy more gas for the same amount of energy, and it would never end up with a 60 minutes special about how it has been poisoning all of us for decades. We should have been using it the whole damn time.

thank you, this is interesting and a great point for further research

Having done triangle tests with Mexican Coke and HFCS Coke, I find it unbelievable someone "can't stand" one and enjoys the other.

Mexican Coke doesn't use cane sugar anymore. But when it did, I'd read that the sucrose in peak-era Mexican Coke broke down into a HFCS-similar mix of fructose and glucose in the drink's acidity anyway.

I'm convinced the Mexican Coke thing is just some hipster thing, and Coca-Cola is glad to exploit it.

Having also done blind taste tests, I can pretty reliably pick out the mexican coke, but I agree that it's unlikely that someone would love one but not the other in a cup.

I think the real differentiator is drinking out of a glass bottle vs. a can.

I could still taste the difference after decanting to a cup. I felt like it was still mostly can/bottle, but didn't have an American bottle to use as a control.

There definitely is a subtle difference. I was about to pick out the different drink reliably. It's just hard to imagine the difference is make-or-break between enjoying and intolerable for anyone. And it less likely comes from the sweetener and more from the Mexican water versus the water at your local Coca-Cola bottler.

West coast Coke vs East coast Coke would be an interesting test I've never thought about doing.

I can reliably pick out the difference between bottle, canned, and fountain Coke and Pepsi (all 6 variations). Out of the fountain, Coke and Pepsi are sweeter than their packaged counterparts (because the syrup is usually fresher and more concentrated); Pepsi tastes somewhat like a blend of Coke and watered-down Dr Pepper. Canned Coke and Pepsi have a metallic taste not found in its bottled or fountain counterparts (and this taste remains even if poured into a cup).

For bottled Coke, HCFS Coke and Mexican/Kosher Coke taste similar but not the same: HCFS Coke has stronger/bolder (one-note type of) sweetness but sugar Coke has a broader sweetness.

All versions of regular Pepsi have a cloying aftertaste.

Hello Rishi, nice to have you lurk around.