Fizz fuss: ‘No alcohol content in Coke’

By PMA RASHEED

17 Feb 2011, The Gulf Today

A top official of the Dubai Municipality (DM) has ruled out any possibility of alcohol content in Coca Cola sold in Dubai and the UAE market.

He was responding to international media reports claiming that Coca Cola’s tightly-guarded recipe had been leaked out and that it contained certain percentage of alcohol, among a number of other ingredients, in the secret flavour formula.

The fuss about the fizz oozed out after the recipe was reportedly published by National Public Radio’s ‘This American Life’ earlier this week.

Khalid Mohammed Shareef, director of Food Control Department at the DM told The Gulf Today over the phone that there was no alchoholic content in Coke sold in the UAE. 

“The regulations mandate that ingredients should be declared on label and it’s always verified and tested when required,” he added.

“The country has got sufficient mechanisms to ensure that all food items consumed by the residents are safe and free from all prohibited ingredients,” Shareef indicated.

“No alcoholic content was found out in our lab tests in the beverage. The food testing laboratories in the country are operating at the highest global standards, also networked with the all the labs across the world,” he confirmed.

No representative of the Coca Cola in Dubai was available for comments.

But Western media quoted Coca Cola spokesperson Kerry Tressler as saying: “Many third parties have tried to crack our secret formula. Try as they might, they have been unsuccessful because there is only one real thing.”