Output Stream of Consciousness

Now, regular Diet Coke is gross. It's just... gross. So when I started seeing some Splenda-based Pepsi products and the like south of the border, I got kinda excited.

Then I see Coca Cola Zero show up here, and the sweetener is... aspartame!??

I was agog. I thought they had just pulled a rename of Diet Coke. Well, recently, I decided to try a 591 mL experiment of the stuff.

You know what? It didn't totally suck. Still a little bit of that chewed chewing gum aftertaste, but nothing close to what Diet Coke has.

Aspartame is just a dipeptide - but it's unstable at high temperatures and may break down slowly at low temperatures. I'm pretty sure the usual nasty taste is from breakdown products.

Which leads me to wonder, what with Minute Maid Light and a few other non-sucky aspartame drinks, have they finally figured out how to stabilize aspartame so that it doesn't break down?