The Novelty Sodas

Go back in time with Sarah and The Shrub as they get into some strange flavored pops, novelty drinks, and retired sodas. This lighthearted episode is full of gratitude for living sober, the sober journey, and all the fun we can have when we go for it.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tab_(drink)

https://www.bonappetit.com/story/save-tab-soda-interview?srsltid=AfmBOopduhSk3I6jdpOIvJeK0EG0kZDKBhWZbyhSe-YY9GobT3fXWAey

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbitz_(drink)#History

https://www.mashed.com/1361798/discontinued-orbitz-soda-scientific-marvel/

http://www.lanceandeskimo.com/chefelf/bev_orbitz.shtml

https://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/completelist/0,29569,1913612,00.html

https://www.mashed.com/60683/soft-drinks-totally-forgot-existed/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocaine_(drink)#

https://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/03/nyregion/03cocaine.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enviga

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocaine_(drink) 

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cocaine-pulled-from-shelves-nationwide/ 

ig: @shrubbish_pod
email: shrubbishpodcast@gmail.com

While I want to bring levity to the table, this podcast does contain descriptions of substance abuse. If you or someone you know needs help, the SAMHSA (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration) hotline is available 24/7 at 1-800-662-HELP (4357). 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Lick your lips and settle in. Life's a bumpy ride. Daily fresh-baked whores clamoring to get inside. There's so much rubbish out there, it kinda makes you think. Maybe I'll stay in today and sip a special drink. Hi, I'm Sarah McAfee. I'm an alcoholic and a drug addict, and this is Shrubbish. And got some news for y'all. Um, this is probably the last episode of Shrubbish. Um obviously I did not stick to the two-week um publishing plan that has been in place the last couple episodes, and just some other things have taken priority right now. Um and also I do sort of feel like this little journey has run its course. So we're here and we're gonna we're gonna have some fun today. Um, and then we'll say a sweet goodbye. And I hope you all know how much it it means to me that you've been listening this this whole time. Um you know it has it has nothing to do with I'm not gonna stop making shrubs and I'm not gonna stop uh being a sober alcoholic. Um But there's other there's other things that I want to spend my energies on right now, and I I don't feel like I can do all of it. Um I feel like that's a pretty normal human thing to feel. So in this last, you know, 20 to 30 minutes that we have together, let's let's have a little bit of fun and taste a little bit of a a shrub. One of the things obviously I really wanted to get to in this whole journey of whatever two years I've been doing this um off and on, is I did want I really and I kept saying I was gonna do it too. I was promising you I was gonna do it, is that I was gonna learn about like the de-alcohol dealcoholization process. Um and I never did that because it sounded confusing, and I didn't I didn't want to be confused. Um so I thought about doing that for this episode, and then when I realized that this was probably gonna be the last one, I was like, well, let's definitely keep with the light and fun. So sorry for the bait and switch, but there will be no de-alcoholization process learning on this podcast. Uh that's gonna be that sounds like something we can do on our own times. I I encourage you, you know, if this podcast has encouraged you, similarly to things like stuff you should know, which was a big encouragement for me to do this podcast was the podcast stuff you should know. Um if you're inspired by like learning little facts, just go on a little internet journey, you know, put down the scrolling and go on Wikipedia. Um and then donate $5. And then, you know, enjoy, enjoy an experiment experience of learning about little random things. Um and I'm sure that we can all learn about the de-alc de-alcoholization process. I can't say that without pausing. Um and uh yeah, we can all do that on our own. So now I'm trying to remember why I was going down this journey to begin with. I was thinking there might be some sort of like a hidden world of novelty drinks. Um I I saw online a few weeks ago that there was a some sort of a soda that was like a b a butter flavor, I think it was butter soda, and then something else. And I personally have heard on um uh I said no gifts, funny, amazing little podcast, uh the host was gifted um a Mr. Cucumber soda. And then I know on here um one of our listeners gifted me a celery soda, and so I was like, there's gotta be some sort of an interesting history of novelty sodas or beverages that we could explore. Um and then, you know, in the in the vein of Snapple, and um and then I just I ended up finding these like weird, like retired drinks. I went down this little rabbit hole of uh kind of novelty sodas, retired drinks, weird things that sprung up from the past. It reminded me a lot of okay soda, which does also have like that okay soda does to kind of tie into this episode in another specific way. But that's kind of what I got for you today is uh a top three novelty drink, retired soda situation. Um, and then a couple runners up that I thought were funny. So there were some great lists online. Um I got some stuff. There's a a lot of content about this. If you're curious yourself, I highly recommend doing a Google search. There's a lot of really interesting, weird drinks that we came up with. And that's the thing I was kind of saying on the Snapple episode, too, is it's like something happened in like the 90s and the early aughts where people were just had wild ideas for things we could put in our bodies, and we're gonna talk about some of them right now. So the first one, I because I thought about maybe doing a specific episode on this too, and there's actually not that much information about it. Um, but the first one is Tab. Everybody knows Tab, right? Um, bright pink can, retro kind of style, although at the time probably wasn't retro. Um but Tab was Coca-Cola's first diet drink. It was introduced in 1963. So already in 1963 we were, I mean, you know, the house housewives, I'm sure, were worrying about their their waist sizes to please their husband. Um as they cooked the dinner and prepared for him to come home. This is the first thing, first thing I think of is that diet drinks were definitely geared, and it was pink. So I'm thinking this was definitely geared towards women um to make us feel like we needed to look a certain way. Anyway, um, but it doesn't talk about that in any of the research that I that I did. But it's got that cool pink can, it's like a a capital T, a lowercase A, and a capital B. Um and yeah, it was uh it was super popular for a couple decades, but then they introduced Diet Coke. So I'm not really sure why they didn't just introduce Diet Coke to begin with. Uh, but first we had Tab, which does not taste like Diet Coke. We will get into the flavor. Um so it died off with the introduction of Diet Coke, but also there were issues with like the type of sweetener, the artificial sweetener that was used for it, um, was saccharin. And there was a there became some sort of a concern that it was going to cause bladder cancer because they did a test and it caused bladder cancer in rats. But the amount of it would like the amount of saccharine that the rats were consuming, I don't even know that it would be possible for people to consume it. So there was like a big warning label and a whole bunch of stuff that contained saccharin, and people were like, don't eat that, gonna get bladder cancer. And then it kind of they kind of walked that back and were like, no, you can probably eat some saccharin, that's fine. But by that point, some damage was already done. So that may have contributed to the to the decline of Tab. Um, but I think more likely it was maybe the flavor of Tab, which doesn't sound very good. Um there's like an online community, by the way, of people that like want to bring Tab back. Um Tab was discontinued in officially in October 2020. Um Coca-Cola announced that it was um discontinuing Tab because of like COVID cost issues, um, along with some other lines of beverage can including something called Delaware Punch. Um Dicoke Feisty Cherry, um, and some Northern Neck beverages, which I didn't even know that was a line of drinks. But um, Delaware Punch is confusing to me. I don't really know what that is. Uh but yeah, so they discontinued it in 2020. But the so there's this like group of people that would let love Tab and want to bring it back. Um and amongst them and as well as other people, I've been able to pin down that the flavor of Tab has been related to old flat diet Pepsi. Um, it's tart, there's a hint of lemon, and the most iconic flavor in Tab is the metallic bite of the saccharine sweetener. So that sounds bad to me. That sounds gross, and and so I think maybe that contributed to why Tab was not super popular. Um, you know, if your options in 1965 are Coke with sugar or Tab with no sugar, I guess you'll drink the one with no sugar, even though it tastes like an ass rat's ass. But um yeah, there's better options now uh for those flavor forward. One thing I did think was interesting, and this is where I mentioned that it um kind of applies to okay soda too, is that they actually used a kind of a similar naming convention to come up with it. Um for okay soda, they used like data to come up with like the most what were the the most commonly used words in the English language or something like that, right? And it was Coca-Cola or Coke was one of them. And then okay was like number two. So they went with okay soda was the name. And so for this one, um, they used a computer to generate a list of single syllable four-letter words, and then also had their like staff go through that as well and and add their own words to it. Um and tab came up as like a favorite, and then the sort of slogan became like keeping tabs on weight. So also I don't know why tab with a with two B's, single syllable, four-letter words, tab with two B's. I don't know that Tab has two B's, so I don't really know how they found that, but maybe Ryan in the office said, let's add a second B onto tab, and there he is four-livered words, and then everyone clapped for Ryan. Anyway, so that's Tab. Uh, I just wanted to give a little bit of background on that one. This next one was something that I I'm sure I've heard referenced, but this is a wild thing to me. There's a drink that existed called Orbitz. Probably some people listening to this podcast know what Orbitz was. Maybe you've even tried an Orbitz. Many people probably don't because it's weird. So, do you know, do you know the brand Clearly Canadian? They have like these little tiny um sparkling waters that look really elite. That's kind of like a blue glass bottle, light blue, and they have like a nice little like strawberry on the front. They're it's sort of like a glass bottle fancy hoity-toy-dy version of LaCroix. Okay, clearly Canadian. So in in 1996, they developed what I'm sure they thought was going to be the best new thing on the market. It was a beverage called orbits. And what it was was an another little glass bottle with tiny gelatinous balls suspended in the liquid. Um, and they were colorful, like bright orange, bright purple, bright red, tiny little balls, sort of like boba, but teeny tiny teeny tiny. Um, like a b like have you seen a basil drink out and about? Kind of looks like that. The weird thing though was when you shook the bottle, they would move around as though part of a liquid. But when you when the bottle was still, they would be still. So it was s it sort of looks like, or it's been described as sort of as though it was like connected through like a spider web within the liquid, which sort of happened because the liquid had just like a slightly higher viscosity than water. Um, just slightly higher. It included Xanthem gum and gelin gum, which would just sort of create enough suspension to hold the b the little balls in place. People likened it to looking like a lava lamp. And the problem, I think, was that the texture was simply horrible. Like it it sort of people have described it as feeling like you were drinking boogers. Um, and I I can't say this for certain, but it feels like the viscosity of the water would, you would, your tongue would pick up on that just a little bit. So it wouldn't be like drinking a s a straight-through liquid, it would be like something that just has a little bit more tone to it than normal water, which sounds real gross. Um and then they also had like the flavors were someone said it it tastes like cough syrup. Um, but the flavors were crazy. Like, okay, vanilla orange. Okay, we've seen that. Fine. Blueberry, melon, strawberry. That's so many flavors, and also a smoothie. Pineapple, banana, cherry, coconut. What? Uh, I think it was in the on the market for less than a year. Uh, it did not do well. It was introduced in 1996 and it was off the market by 1998. Um, it was a failure. And there are still some videos on there's this like website called Lance and Eskimo, and they do some taste tests of I don't really know what Lance and Eskimo is. There's their website has a lot going on. It also looks like it was made in 1996 and maybe never updated. Sorry, Lance and Eskimo. But they um someone there tastes orbits and describes it, and that's quite funny. I recommend reading that. It's gross. Um, so that was number two on my on the list that I found that I thought was pretty funny. Um the number one strange beverage that I discovered on this journey is an energy is an energy drink called cocaine. And the the the label, like the design of it of the can is made like it's a it's a a white font that looks like powder. It looks like you've written cocaine in white powder. Um so they're not fooling around. It was distributed by um Hype Beverages. Um the founder James Kirby basically named it that sort of like for a flashy humorous effect, which like could theoretically be fine. Um when did this get when was this? This was in like 2012, I think. Let me see. Oh no, it was uh 2006. So, yes, part of the early aughts, weird this weird business I was talking about. Um so theoretically, yes, that name is like funny or whatever, but also like there's a people have serious issues with cocaine. And they were also sort of like trying to promote it as like like a a beverage version of cocaine that also sort of maybe I only read this one place, but also maybe had like a numbing effect in it that would make you sort of feel like like after you do a line of blow, like the there's like a numbing quality that happens in the back of your throat, or if you like rub it on your gums and your mouth gets numb. These are some insider trading informations about cocaine. And so, but it also had like a spicy element to it. So maybe those are connected, but it was um supposed to give you a lot of energy, and it was also spicy and maybe mouth-numbing. Um and lawmakers and anti-drug organizations were pissed. Um, 7-Eleven publicly asked their stores to remove it from the shelves. Everybody was saying that they were basically trying to say that this was cocaine in a can. Um, from the CBB CBS article, it says um the FDA cited uh as evidence the drink's labeling and website, which included the statements speed in a can, liquid cocaine, and cocaine instant rush. So that's what it's promoting that you would experience when you drink it. Um and so they got sued, or they were asked to like come up with a different name. So they came up with a new name called no name. The new name for the drink was called no name. But then there was copy copyright infringement upon that name, so the name went back to cocaine. Um and so now the the beverage is back to the you can buy it. There's a website. If you go to hypebeverages.com, you can go and you can order of a line of drinks. There's various flavors. They have a no-sugar one. Um and it's called and now they like promote it as like pre-workout kind of. You can only buy it in stores, I think, in Minnesota and Georgia. Uh, but you can order it for yourself to be delivered to your house. Um, and you know I wanted to do that. I also really want to know what's like what the spicy flavor is. So maybe I will, I don't know. I don't really know that I wanted to spend $22 on like, you know, I did I did cocaine. I don't need to do it again. Although I did go out with some friends on um Friday night. We were gonna, some sober friends, we were like gonna go out and like, you know, see the scene, but like as a sober crew. Um and I downed like a yurba mate, like as we were walking to to the bar, and um I was real, I was having a good time, I was dancing, I was all like pumped up, and my friends were like, You're all you're like cocaine light right now, because I was so energized. Um, I talked to a lot of people that say, it's interesting that you used to do cocaine because you have a lot of natural energy, which is true. So I don't know that I need to be doing this energy drink. See, I said doing, not drinking. Like we should we shouldn't be doing the cocaine drink. Tab also had a uh an energy drink that and that's how I first became introduced to Tab. It came out in 2006, and I was doing a uh in high school, I was doing a play, and one of the gals in the play was you was drinking Tab energy drinks. Um, and that's how I first learned about Tab was then. So I do have a couple runner-up things that I thought were fun. Um this was another one of the inspirations for this episode was Joan's soda. I don't know if y'all remember Joan Soda. They used to sell it at the like the first like fun, cool coffee shop I used to go to when I was a kid. And Joan's soda always had like kind of interesting flavors. They would come up with new weird things, and they had this infamous um Thanksgiving Day four-pack of soda, which I never got to try. I'm always down to try weird stuff. I want to try the weird flavored candies, I want to try the soup lozenge, I want to eat the barf-flavored bean, like I want to try the weird stuff. I haven't tried these yet. I don't know if you can still buy them. This because this is from a long time ago. Um, but they had green bean casserole-flavored soda, mashed potato and butter, cranberry, and turkey and gravy sodas. Um, obviously, cranberry soda sounds awesome. The other ones sound weird, right? But I would like to try them. Um, and then maybe mix them all together and have yourself a meal. Uh no. The other one that was uh weird to me was something called Inviga or InViga. Um, this was from also 2006, a weird time. Oh my god, so 2006 we've got Tab Energy, Cocaine Soda, and InViga, which is a it was promoted as a negative calorie drink. Theoretically, by drinking this, you would burn calories. I don't know about that. I don't know. They were sued. They were sued. It lasted less than two years. Um, they were sued for fraudulent health claims. I don't know that they were saying that it would help you lose weight. I don't know what they were saying, but I don't know. I don't know about the burning calories thing. Because even celery, isn't there some sort of like a defunct thing about that too? Like celery contains calories, but digesting it burns more. I don't know. It had green tea in it, this drink. And I guess green tea is like boosts your metabolism, but that doesn't I don't know. Um the other one that was I remember the ads for this too, I don't think I ever tried it when I was a kid. Um, Coca-Cola Black, which it has the aftertaste of coffee. So like right at the end, like you drink it, it tastes like Coke, and then kind of right at the end it tastes like coffee, which in and of itself is weird. But the weirdest part to mean, which is why it's on this runner-up list, is because it's spelled Coca-Cola B-L-A-K, capital K. Why is it spelled like that? That's so weird. Like what these naming conventions for these drinks are wild. It's like the chicken, the little fake the chicken, fake vegan chicken things. Um black. Uh and then the the other one that I just this was warmed my heart because I do I do remember these ads as well, and also can't remember if I ever tasted it, although I liked soda growing up, so probably did. Um was Diet Pepsi Jazz. Um, which w the it was supposed to be like the smooth flavors of jazz, uh, such as black cherry vanilla, strawberries and cream, and caramel cream. So just go ahead and add those sickly sweet flavors onto your high fructose corn syrup sparkling concoction, and you're ready for a heart attack. Um, so yeah. Those are some weird, weird beverages that I implore you all to go out into the world and try if they're still existing. They're not, except for um cocaine soda. And uh Joan sodas has still has some weird stuff. So um get out there and try your strange drinks. Make your strange drinks. Try them. Get weird. I do really wish that I could try an orbit. The problem is that they are all definitely expired at this point. I watched someone on the internet try an expired bit of orbit soda, and nothing happened to him live in that moment, but I don't know what happened to him later. And I don't really want to do that. I'm also very afraid of botulism. So which we discussed on here. So, we are nearing that time. Listen, I just want to express a lot of gratitude for all of you who have been listening. Um, I know I touched on that at the beginning, but it's true. Um this this none of the things none of the things that I have in my life right now would be possible, would exist if I was still in active addiction. You know, I do a gratitude list. Almost every day. And I try to come up with new things that are unique to that last 24 hours. Um, but there are a through line of things that I am grateful for all the time. I have um community, sober community specifically. I'm gonna get emotional. Um, that is a a very specific, like unique, wonderful group of people that I am in constant I like I see them regularly. We share about sobriety, but we also share about, you know, we're actually friends, um, and we we experience culture together and um we talk about politics and you know, the state of the world and being alive and all the things that you do as a human. Um and I wouldn't have that if I hadn't gotten sober. And I started experiencing artistic community, this whole kind of new way of seeing how to be an artist in this weird world that we're in right now, and and what it means to create and different ways to do that, and seeing it from different people's perspectives, and that wouldn't exist. Relationships with my family wouldn't exist without sobriety. So there's all these wonderful things that wouldn't exist. Um and I never would have decided to try something that seemed new and scary, but also exciting if I hadn't gotten sober. Because when I was drinking and using, I was just in the East Village yesterday, when I was drinking and using, I just went to the East Village and did drugs. That's all I did. And instead, a couple years ago, I decided, you know, I want to make something, and I want to learn some things, and I like, you know, NA mixology, and I want to share that and share some quirky fun with anybody who wants to listen. And it's been really fun. But it's also run its course, and that's okay too. I encourage anyone who's listening to this to just do the thing. Do the thing. There was one day I woke up after the worst hangover of my life, unable to accomplish a very simple task of going to an online class to sit and read proof. And I couldn't I couldn't do it. And I said, I don't want to live like this anymore. The one thing that I keep holding on to is that I want to be able to drink because it's so important to me. And I've been trying to fight that battle for years, and I can't do it anymore. Um, I have to let that go. So I just did the thing. And with this podcast, I just did the thing. I wouldn't be doing the thing if it weren't for sobriety. Um so whether you are sober or not, just do the thing. Okay. Let's drink a shrub. Now this has been chilling in my fridge for a little while, so I hope it I hope it still tastes good. My idea here was to do oh, I can smell it. Oh, it smells nice. My idea here was to do something um sort of summery themed, and then I was making it, and then we got hit with another mean fake winter. Boo, stupid. But it's nice again. Uh so perfectly on theme. This is a raspberry lemonade shrub. Really, what this is was a quick shrub with uh raspberry and lemon rind in a with sugar, just like a syrup, and then with vinegar for 24 hours and then strained through. So this wasn't like a countertop shrub. It's a beautiful color. It's one of the things that's nice about this too is it's really kind of clear because I strained it, right? Combined everything in the pan, strained it, and then let that juice sit with the with the vinegar. Oh, maybe I should have let it all sit with the vinegar first. I don't know, doesn't matter. Um so it's a lovely deep rose kind of color. Um do a smell here. It does it does smell of lemon and raspberry. One thing I'm wondering right now, though, is what I called it pink lemonade because that sounded cute and that brings like a nice picture. But what is the flavor of pink lemonade? That I simply don't know. And this does not look like pink lemonade because pink lemonade generally looks like like bubblegum pink, right? It's like pink pink. This is definitely more red. And definitely has the the notes of both raspberry and lemon. So ideally, they will be kind of coming through evenly. This is my goal. I tried to be really balanced with the amount of lemon rind that I was using for this. Um, that was my knees cracking. In case anyone just heard that horrifying sound. But let's do a taste test and see what we got. Can confirm that is almost perfectly 50-50 raspberry lemon. Um, pretty much the perfect amount of sweet. The I could use maybe a little bit more vinegar. I think probably unless you're like a really tart vinegar forward kind of kind of person, this is probably more your vibe, if I'm honest. So that's actually something to note if you're if you've been on this shrub journey and are making your own shrubs or are interested in in making shrubs. If you want to get something that's sweeter and less vinegar forward, maybe do this quick shrub version where you're making basically a syrup and mixing that with vinegar and then mixing that with your sparkling water or your, as I'm doing here, just chilled um still water. If you want something that might have a bit more of that vinegar bite, I think those countertop versions are gonna be more for you. Uh it's a is a general theme that I'm kind of thinking about right now. Not that not to say that it can't go the other direction either way, but I think generally speaking, you can it's gonna be maybe sweeter if you do it on the on the stove. Yeah, this this reminds me of kombucha, like that you would buy in a store, like a raspberry lemon kombucha, which sounds kind of good. So maybe I'll get one of those after this. But yeah, that's delightful. Definitely summery. Would love for like a picnic or honestly just like sipping on a hot afternoon by itself. You don't need it's it's very sweet, it's very flavorful. You don't need this with food. This would pair very well um with some cheese or by itself. Listen, I pair with cheese. I'm not a cheesemonger. I don't know what I'm talking about, but it would I think it would be good with some cheese and a cracker. Okay. Well, listen. That brings us to the end of this episode. Yes, I'm a little emotional. Um a little sad about it, but I also know it's the right thing to do. So please take care of yourselves. I know it's a tough world that we're living in, but there is good stuff, and I think making stuff is a part of that. So make the thing, do the thing. You can always email me if you want to chat about anything. These episodes aren't going away for now. They'll be up at least for another year or so. Um, I'll keep them archived so you can still access anything you want to listen to, and feel free to keep sharing it with people if that brings you joy. Um and I'll see you around. Don't let the shrubbish get you down. Okay? Take care. Bye-bye. Thanks for tuning in to Shrubbish. Of course, I wouldn't be able to do this alone. Research references are available in the show notes, and that spunky show art and design is by the incredibly talented Alex Crawford. If you're looking to connect, we're on Instagram at Shrubbish underscore pod, or you can send an email to shrubbishpodcast at gmail.com.