Carbonated water
Food
Water. Carbonated means carbon dioxide is dissolved in it — the bubbles — not an added mineral cocktail.
Reference
Plain Label
What an ingredient list is actually saying — the job of the additive, the rule that covers it, and the places the rulebooks disagree.
Paste from a package. It deciphers as you type. Nothing is uploaded.
- Additives
- 5
- Foods
- 1
- Flags
- 0
- On your list
- 0
high fructose corn syrup
Sweetener
Permitted
What it is
Corn syrup in which some of the glucose has been converted to fructose, usually to about 42% or 55% fructose.
Why it is in the food
It is cheap, liquid, and sweet, so it shows up in drinks, sauces, and breads.
How to read it
Table sugar is about half fructose. The nutrition issue is how much added sugar the food carries, not a toxin unique to this syrup.
caramel color
Color · E150
Permitted
What it is
Brown color made by heating sugars, sometimes with acids, alkalis, or sulfite. It is not caramel candy.
Why it is in the food
Gives colas and some breads, sauces, and beers their brown.
How to read it
Permitted. Cola usually uses class IV, which can contain 4-MEI. California lists 4-MEI under Proposition 65; the FDA has said ordinary food levels are not a safety concern. The ingredient adds color, not sweetness.
phosphoric acid
Acid · E338
Permitted
What it is
A mineral acid that tastes sharp and clean.
Why it is in the food
The tang in cola, and a pH drop that slows microbes.
How to read it
Permitted. Heavy cola drinking has been studied next to lower bone mineral density, tangled up with displacing milk. It is not an acid that dissolves the stomach. It is a source of phosphorus.
natural flavors
Flavor
Permitted
What it is
A legal category, not a single ingredient. Under FDA rules it means the flavor came from a plant, an animal, or a fermentation — not that the formula is simple.
Why it is in the food
Carries the taste the food is selling, at levels too low to list chemical by chemical.
How to read it
“Natural” is a source rule, not a health claim. The blend can include solvents and carriers, and the source can be fruit, spice, meat, or a ferment. The label does not have to say which. If you avoid an animal food, this is the line that can hide it.
caffeine
Processing
Permitted
What it is
A stimulant that occurs in coffee, tea, and cacao, and is also added on its own.
Why it is in the food
In cola it is part of the flavor formula and the mild lift. In energy drinks it is the point.
How to read it
A 12-ounce cola is roughly 30 to 40 milligrams. Coffee is several times that. Added caffeine is an active ingredient, not a preservative. Pregnancy and some heart conditions are the usual reasons clinicians set a ceiling.