Soft drinks are not the power players they once were. But don’t feel too bad for the soda brands—they’re all making seltzer and juice now, so they’ll be fine. Nevertheless, a good fizzy soda undeniably hits the spot every now and then, sugar content be damned! And there is one undisputed king in the soda realm: cola. Its dark, refreshing effervescence is synonymous with a summer day trip to an amusement park or a visit to a movie theater. And yet, as much as we love it, we may not know exactly what it tastes like.
What is this flavor that we have such a hankering for? What is cola flavor? What is cola, at all? Where does it come from? Let’s find out!
What flavor is cola?
In order to understand the true nature of cola, we must first take a look at the very first brand to utilize this name, which is of course, Coca-Cola. And while we’re talking about it, we should take a moment to acknowledge what a great product name this is. It bounces off the tongue and is instantly memorable. It also sort of connotes a slight mystery. It doesn’t sound like anything else in the world, and, in fact, it doesn’t taste like anything else in the world.
Coca-Cola was invented in the late 19th century by John Pemberton in Atlanta, GA. It was originally intended as a temperance beverage—an alternative to alcohol—and the great name comes from two of the original beverage’s ingredients: coca leaves and the kola nut.
We’ll leave the coca leaf aspect for the moment (for more information, talk to any fifth grader who wants to blow your mind about the original ingredients in Coke). What of the kola nut? It turns out it is a seed from the Cola plant, which is somewhat closely related to cotton and cacao. It is native to tropical African rainforests and, notably, the kola nuts contain caffeine.
So, cola tastes like kola nut, right? Well, not quite. In the same way that a bottle of Coca-Cola no longer contains coca leaves, it also does not contain kola nuts. In fact, from the mass of anecdotal evidence I was able to find on some web forums, the kola nut tastes almost nothing like a modern cola. It has an astringent flavor, a slight sweetness, and a very nutty aftertaste. Not necessarily what you want in your drink today.
Nowadays, cola is a whole classification of soda. Other notable players in the space are of course Pepsi, RC Cola, and some other weird ones that no one’s ever heard of. When we’re talking about cola these days, we’re referring to a beverage that’s flavored with vanilla, cinnamon, and citrus oils (orange, lime, and lemon peels, to be specific). There are of course some other, mysterious flavors as well—Coca-Cola is famously secretive about their proprietary recipe—but we can be pretty certain they no longer use actual kola nuts.
