The wonderful world of TikTok has produced some surprisingly useful food and drink hacks over the years. There's the tortilla wrapping hack, the salmon rice bowl, the whipped coffee, and of course, the genius hack to soften butter.
But when scrolling through TikTok last night, I saw something—a hack of sorts—that stopped me in my tracks. It was a video from Zachariah Porter, who is known for testing food hacks and recreating dishes like the Bloomin' Onion. He said that he saw a girl on TikTok mix balsamic vinegar and soda water to make a healthier version of Coke.
Now, I love balsamic vinegar as much as the next person—on a salad or some mozzarella—but have zero desire to drink it. But before I went to sleep last night, I saw no less than four other TikToks featuring people trying it with varying reactions.
TyBott called it a scam, and zozoroe sarcastically said it tastes "just like Coke." The hashtag #healthycoke had 5.3 million views and #healthycokechallenge had almost 1 million when I wrote this story.
The originator of the healthy Coke trend, Amanda Jones, credits her pilates instructor with the idea. "I am not joking you," she said in her video. "It tastes just like a Coke, and you're going to think I'm insane."
Well, the only way to see for sure was to try it for myself.
I mixed a few dashes of balsamic vinegar with some soda water I made in my SodaStream. I added ice and a straw—I wanted to give this the best chance of tasting good. Visually, it looks exactly like Coke. I hesitantly took a sip. I was expecting to be repulsed, with the strong, acidic flavor of the vinegar totally overpowering my mouth. But honestly, it wasn't that bad.
The sweetness of the balsamic mimics the taste of cola. There's a bit of a fruitiness, even. Does it taste like Coke? Not really. And the aroma gives salad dressing way more than cola. The flavor is more of a semi-fruity soda, and I credit the bubbles in the soda water for that.
Porter said it best at the end of his video: "You know how like healthy people will tell you Greek yogurt is good? It's like that."
