[mint5]

But why does everything need to be sweet? Most things don’t need sweetened and shouldn’t be sweet.

Of the things that do benefit from sweeteners, they always need like 1/5 the level added.

Americans have been trained to love saccharine levels of sweetness. People can easily handle and enjoy lower levels of sweetness if they just do it for a few weeks to recalibrate from candy land.

[midiguy]

It's not that everything has to be sweet, but rather that, for example, Coke really isn't Coke without sweetness and people just happen to enjoy Coke. And if you're going to enjoy a Coke, Coke Zero or Diet Coke is better for your health.

Of course there are other things like coffee that really are not defined by sweetness and can be perfectly enjoyed unsweetened.

[cyberax]

A guy on the Internet recently reverse-engineered the Coke formula and published the recipe. I always liked Diet Coke, the regular one is just too sweet for me.

So I replicated the recipe, and I actually liked unsweetened Cola! It feels a bit tea-like, but also more acidic. Kinda like coffee but without the bitter undertone.

If you like Coke drinks, I highly recommend it.

[MrDrMcCoy]

I've seen a number of attempted coke replicas, but this one sounds like the best. Would you kindly share the link?

[cyberax]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TDkH3EbWTYc

[JCattheATM]

There are lots of cola recopies, why is this guy confident he has Coke's?

[cyberax]

He used chromatography and mass spec to match the chemical composition, along with taste tests.

Many people also tried this recipe and can't tell the difference in blind tests between it and various types of Coke.

[tptacek]

The Japanese diet, which people in the west sort of accept as default-healthy, is also heavily sweetened; that is, it uses "sweet" as a flavor component probably even more than Americans do. Japanese home cooking adds sugar to savory dishes the way Americans add black pepper.

I think it's obvious that Japanese people generally consume less sugar than Americans do, so it's not my argument that sugar is fine or that the western diet isn't problematic.

Rather: the idea that there's some moral/health advantage to avoiding sweetness is unfounded, kind of culturally blinkered, won't hold up under scrutiny.