All Soda Is Lemon-Lime Soda
“Actually, we have Starry,” the counter clerk said. It was early spring of this year, and I was ordering a lemon-lime soft drink. I had asked for Sprite but was told that the establishment, a Pepsi shop, had Sierra Mist instead. But wait, it didn’t have that either, because Pepsi had just killed off its 22-year-old lemon-lime brand and replaced it with a new one: Starry. Did I want a Starry? I guessed so. What was the difference? I couldn’t tell; it tasted like lemon-lime soda, a flavor too ordinary to remark upon.
But wait: Why should “lemon-lime,” as a combination, be so ordinary? Lemons and limes are both tart citrus, but very few other foods or beverages, packaged or prepared, put the two together. Let’s face it: It’s not normal to squeeze both lemons and limes onto your tacos, or bake them into key-lime-and-lemon pies. And do Sprite or 7Up or Sierra Mist or Starry really even taste like the merger of these fruits? Or is “lymon,” as Coca-Cola has sometimes characterized Sprite’s flavor, merely a marketing gimmick that has duped me, you, and the world?
Seeking answers, I embarked on a voyage into the history of citrus and soda—and learned from my travels that lemon-lime is less a flavor than an archetype, a bright, vibrant antidote to
