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DIY Cola

Free yourself from the tyranny of corporate soda! Do it yourself with the open-source OpenCola.

And, uh, just in case you think OpenCola might be more... virtuous than your standard corporate soda, don't be fooled.

When you make cola, you basically end up filling a glass with sugar and then adding just enough water and ancillary ingredients to get it to dissolve.
-Cory Doctorow, on OpenCola

Opencola.png

OpenCola

Flavoring

  • 3.50 ml orange oil
  • 1.00 ml lemon oil
  • 1.00 ml nutmeg oil
  • 1.25 ml cassia oil
  • 0.25 ml coriander oil
  • 0.25 ml neroli oil
  • 2.75 ml lime oil
  • 0.25 ml lavender oil
  • 10.0 g gum arabic
  • 3.00 ml water

Concentrate

  • 2.00 tsp (10 ml) flavoring
  • 3.50 tsp (17.5 ml) 75% phosphoric acid or citric acid
  • 2.28 l water
  • 2.36 kg granulated white sugar
  • 0.50 tsp (2.5 ml) caffeine (optional. use caution)
  • 30.0 ml caramel color
Making the actual soda pretty much boils down to using the standard 5:1 ratio of carbonated water to concentrate. Quick and dirty instructions are here, or a more complete version is here [PDF], which includes tips for finding ingredients, and really important warnings about messing around with phosphoric acid, caffeine and gum arabic.

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DIY Cola posted on May 24, 2007.

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