The first is some German shower gel that I purchased in Chicago at Merz Apothecary. This particular scent is Traumland or Dreamland. The top was interesting in that the purple band you see pops up like a draw bridge with the spout positioned at about 11 o'clock on the bottle. It smelled nice and cleaned the Teutonic parts of my body just as well as domestic shower gels. The only difference that I could tell was that this stuff foamed up just a smidgen less than its American counterparts. But maybe this is a hallucination on my part as I tended to use this stuff in the morning before I had the requisite amount of coffee.
A shower gel is a shower gel to me, but it was nice to cruise around Lincoln Square in Chicago. I think that the 4700 block of North Lincoln Ave. has more German shops, restaurants, and stores than all of Madison.
Next up is Coca Cola. For many years I've heard that the Coke in the American South was sweetened with cane sugar as opposed to the stuff with corn syrup that we Yankees get. Well, I spent some time in Louisiana about 3 years ago and could not find Coke with cane sugar. This story would have died had it not been for an article I read a week or two ago about the market for Coke from Mexico, which is sweetened with sugar. Apparently our country's growing Latino population enjoys the Coke from south of the border as a little taste of their homeland. The Coca Cola company frowns on the importation of the product but, since it is not a counterfeit product, shipments cannot be stopped at the border. Coke officials deny any flavor difference saying that the syrup is the same the world 'round and that the sweetener of choice doesn't impact taste.
My culinary curiosity was again piqued and I found a site on the Net that sells Mexican Coke sweetened with cane sugar. I pointed this out to The Dulcinea only to have her respond by saying that Woodman's carries the stuff. It took a few days before I actually purchased the bottle above and, in the intervening period was actually at a Mexican grocery store - Super Tienda Latina. But somehow the notion of checking out their soft drink aisle escaped me. So they may very well stock it there.
On a side note, I do want to say that I went to Super Tienda Latina on a Saturday when they had hot, fresh tamales. No wonder I forgot to look for the Coke. The tamales were fantastic! I wish they had been a bit hotter/spicier but were great nonetheless. I was reminded of my childhood when I got to eat fresh tamales fairly regularly. First there was my friend Lalo's mom, Mrs. Valdez. The Valdez family moved from Mexico to a home just a few houses down the street from mine. She was often found to be cooking up a storm when I went over to Lalo's house which would be filled with magnificent aromas. She'd often make her own tortillas and her tamales are the gold standard for me. I was also able to eat tamales down at Independence Park because there was a guy who had a push cart from which he sold them. He'd lift up the cover to the hot well and beneath all the steam was a mound of unassuming corn husks...
Anyway...So how does Coke with cane sugar taste? Personally, I prefer Coke over Pepsi. Coke has a nice nutty, bitter flavor while Pepsi is too syrupy sweet for me. I found the Coke from Mexico to be a tad less sweet than the domestic stuff. But I also found the flavor to have been muted. It tasted the same but there was just less of it and it didn't have as much of a bitter bite. While I missed it, I also found that I could drink more of it. I am not a big soda drinker and I usually can only drink half a can of domestic Coke. My palate just gets overwhelmed at some point and I have to stop quaffing. Part of this is due to the soda becoming warm, I'd imagine. As it warms, it loses its crispness and begins to taste syrupy like Pepsi. However, I found that the Coke sweetened with cane sugar mellowed as it got warmer but didn't edge towards that syrupy taste I dislike.
I suspect that Coke with cane sugar can be found at one of the numerous Mexican grocery stores around town but I haven't looked. I found my bottle at Woodman's East in the ethnic foods aisle.
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