The DIY Pause That Refreshes

If you’re tired of the eternal spiritual struggle between Coke and Pepsi, WikiHow has got your back. It has published a recipe for OpenCola, the “open-source cola beverage” you make yourself. The formula’s even licensed under the GNU General Public License so that users can suggest improvements to it.

The good news is that the recipe is available for free, so a sufficiently motivated cola addict could whip up a pretty good-size batch. The bad news is that making cola apparently involves getting your hands on stuff such as nutmeg oil, gum arabic, neroli oil, citric acid, and caffeine.

Oh, and it’s not all fun and games once you acquire the ingredients:

Many of the oils needed for flavoring can burn skin. Use caution when preparing. They can also dissolve the plastic lining of a refrigerator; store with caution.

For all of open source’s admirable qualities, it may ultimately be a little more practical to forgo the neroli oil and just grab a two-liter from the bodega. But for the true believer, open-source recipes may be the key to an unbranded way of life.

Posted by James Norton | Thursday, May 31, 2007 at 7:43am | 2 comments
Tagged with: coke, pepsi, cola, open source cola, opencola, open cola, wiki, open source recipes

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Comments

This falls under the category of things that are much more difficult to make from scratch than the final result is worth, kind of like doing your own dry cleaning.

MsDiPesto May 31, 2007 02:16PM | link

I noted the recipe contains no actual cola nut/cola flavoring. I did a quick web search and one source said that most commercial colas no longer contain actual cola flavoring, either. Anyone know why?

Piglet May 31, 2007 03:36PM | link

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