Soft Drinks and Sugar

A typical carbonated soft drink will have 200 calories in a 16-ounce serving. All of those calories come from sugar, and sugar contains 16 calories per teaspoon. Divide those two and you find a 16-ounce serving contains about 12.5 teaspoons of sugar.

I wanted to compare this to coffee, so I looked at a 12 ounce soda, which has about 140 calories or about 8.75 teaspoons of sugar. Standard coffee cups (not mugs) contain about 6 ounces of fluid. Take half the calories and sugar of a 12 ounce soda and it would take about 4.38 teaspoons of sugar to make coffee as sweet as soda.

What's in a Name

You have all seen those little cardboard thingies that are put around a coffee cup from Starbucks and other coffee places. Did you know there is actually a name for them? They are called zarfs. A zarf was originally a metal chalice keep your hot coffee from burning your fingers. The fancy cup holder has morphed into the modern-day cardboard sleeve that comes wrapped around your hot coffee cup. Next time you are in Starbucks, ask them if the zarf is free. It might be fun to watch the reaction from your barrister...