I'm of the opinion that there are things they should take out of soda (preservatives) and things they should keep (real sugar). But for heaven's sake, nothing should be added to it, especially vitamins.
That's what I discovered in the bottle of Cherry 7-Up I bought. I really should pay more attention to labels. I hadn't noticed that it had a big typeface font that said “New” and more importantly “Antioxidant”, which I found out too late.
After my first sip and tasting what I determined to be something mediciney, I looked more closely at the bottle. Yep…Vitamin E. That's why it seemed funky. Ironically, on the same label, it says “100% Natural Flavors.” “Natural,” as I also learned from this, is a term soda makers seem to use willy nilly, whenever they want, regardless of the fact that HFCS is the second listed ingredient after water.
I just hope it's “natural” enough to water my plants with.
Before becoming an award-winning restaurant critic for OC Weekly in 2007, Edwin Goei went by the alias “elmomonster” on his blog Monster Munching, in which he once wrote a whole review in haiku.