Soft Drinks

Even though we might not think a lot about soft drinks, they do make up a huge part of our diet. This is especially true for young children and adolescents, who are young and active enough not to worry about regulating their sugar intake.

Generally, soft drinks include many different kinds of flavoured and artificially sweetened drinks that are non-alcoholic. Initially, people used the term soft drinks to differentiate sweetened and flavoured drinks from alcoholic drinks. In those days, people who were trying to change their drinking habits used to substitute it with soda. But today,  carbonated drinks are much more diverse and mainstream. This article will tell you everything you need to know about these drinks. Having a better understanding of them will help you make the right choices when you are shopping for them.

Different types of soft drinks

The world of drinks is ever-growing. Every so often, new manufacturers drop a new and innovative type of drink that may hit or miss. Those that become successful stay to see many more decades or even generations. Because of this, the classification of these drinks also changes. Today, it is possible to classify these drinks broadly into four different categories. This article will tell you everything you need to know about carbonated drinks. There are also a few tips that you can use when you are shopping for such products.

Carbonated soft drinks

Carbonated drinks first came into being in the eighteenth century. Today, most of the packaged drinks consumed in the world are carbonated drinks. And not surprisingly, Coca Cola is the most popular drink around the world, followed by Pepsi. However, there are other kinds of drinks as well besides colas. There are plenty of fruit flavoured sodas and low-calorie carbonated drinks. One thing that is common among all of these is the presence of dissolved carbon dioxide in these drinks. This carbon dioxide makes the drink fizzy and makes it more pleasurable to drink.

Fruit Juices

The second most popular category of soft drinks is fruit juices. Packaged fruit juices are of two types: those that contain the flesh of the fruit and those that do not. Packaged fruit juices that actually contain the fruit have a short shelf life. Such fruit juices can only last a few weeks or months before they go bad. The second type of juice is the most common one. Those juices use fruit concentrate instead of the actual fruit. With the help of preservatives, it is possible for such juices to last for well over a year. However, such drinks will not have much nutritional value.

Dilutables

This includes powder drink mixes, squashes, and other drink concentrates that you cannot drink as such. Unlike carbonated drinks and fruit juices, people purchase dilutables mostly for domestic use. There are a couple of reasons for the popularity of dilutables among household customers. Firstly, the drinks made using dilutables cost less for a cup compared to pre-packaged drinks. Secondly, you can store dilutables for a really long time even without refrigeration. Most dilutables, including squashes, are usually fruit-flavoured as well making it appealing to a wider population.

Sports drinks

Unlike fruit juices, colas, or dilutables, sports drinks do not try to fare well when it comes to taste. Rather sports drinks tend to concentrate on being more functional and provide hydration and replace salts lost through sweating. Depending on the formula of the drink, it is possible to divide sports drinks into three categories: hypertonic, isotonic, and hypotonic. Hypertonic drinks contain the most amount of calories. Isotonic drinks have less concentration of carbohydrates than hypertonic but pack more salt and sugar. Hypotonic drinks have the least amount of carbohydrates and contain the most amount of salt and sugar.