Sure, the dentist has that little dish of cola with a tooth in it to show his patients what happens when we drink the sugary-stuff. Sure, the world tells us to drink fewer cans of soda. But for those of us who are addicted to carbonation, isn't it better to have an all-natural soda than some of those completely chemical-laden beverages?
Also, the key to a great-looking and tasting fruit salad is to splash on a little lemon-lime soda. Yes, your mother told you lemon juice keeps the banana from turning brown, but too much lemon creates that sour taste; easier to just douse with soda that contains the lemon plus suuuugar! Really, if you use a slotted spoon to serve the salad, not much of the soda ends up in your tummy anyway.
When I was a kid, the "other kids" may have been sipping Coke, but I preferred Hansen's Key Lime Twist (which has lemon in it too) or Grapefruit. As it turns out, 7-up ended up being Feingold-safe, but then they changed their recipe. They - and Sprite - have gone back and forth with their recipes, so although I generally believe both of these commonly-found lemon-lime sodas to be "safe" (and actually Coke is safe, too, depending on your child's particular sensitivities,) I know that Hansen's is safe.
Hansen's sodas are 100% natural and do not contain any preservatives, caffeine, sodium, high fructose corn syrup, artificial flavors or colors.
Also, Hansen's was one of the first soda companies to have "unique" flavors beyond just those found at the corner fast food joint. These days, you can find sodas like Izze if you want your blueberry juice with a little sparkle, but Hansen's always had flavors like black cherry and mandarin-lime (technically both contain salycilates, but I could tolerate it. Once you have a favorable reaction to Feingold Stage I, you can move on to Stage II to try out some of the salycilates to see which are fine and which are triggers)
Their root beer was the only type I could have as a kid: extra-important for those root-beer floats! Their root-beer ingredients are: pure triple filtered carbonated water, cane sugar, caramel color, natural spices of wintergreen, birch, anise, sassafras, tahitian vanilla extract, and citric acid. Nope, not high-fructose corn syrup-made!
Their ginger ale is similar to the grocery-store type rather than that type that has the huge "bite." There were several "crunchy" soda companies that had those "bite-type" sodas, but I wanted the more mellow variety. (Yes, that goes against everything else in my "got-to-have-spice!" menu preferences, but I guess I need subtlety in my drinks.)
These days, Hansen's has a new line of sodas described as "sparkling water with flavor from pure fruit." I like the dragonfruit and pomegranate-blueberry varieties the best. These are less caloric (90 calories per 10.5 oz) than the regular sodas (140-160 depending on the flavor, for a standard 12 oz can) and similarly do not contain high-fructose corn syrup, sodium, or any of the nasty artificial flavors, colors, or preservatives. Plus, one can of dragonfruit soda is 25% of the US RDA of Vitamin-C! They produce no-sugar varieties (using sucralose) of these "Sparkling Sleek" varieties, too, but I haven't found them at my local store. (I would buy these for me, but wouldn't give the Cat products containing artificial sweetener.)
It is the original soda line that is attractive to my kids. The Cat likes the key lime twist soda the best, saying that the grapefruit variety is too "spicy." I think he might like the vanilla-cola variety; I should pick some up to see what he thinks. (He likes the Whole Foods 365-brand cola and adores vanilla, so we'll see.) I have to look for their Sparkling Green Tea Sleek products, too. It seems that while I've been a Hansen's fan for years there are many products they carry with which I am not yet familiar!
Truthfully, the Cat is more of a vanilla-shake, water, and milk guy than a soda-guy, but on occasion he wants a soda. Fortunately, whether it is a lemon-lime, cola, ginger ale, or root beer craving, we can find Feingold-safe alternatives through Hansen's (and Whole Foods' 365.)
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Hansen's and/or Whole Foods/365 did not sent me any free samples, pay me to say anything nice about the product, or otherwise encourage me to write about their product. Similarly, the majority of other products I mention in the "Feingold Tips" section are simply those which our family happens to use. I share them here just as information to other families interested in the Feingold Diet and all-natural alternatives to "popular" brands.
