Just got back from a trip to England and had the pleasure of drinking English Dr Pepper. It's much fruitier than DP here, with a pronounced black cherry taste. Does anyone know if the recipe is in fact different, or is it just because it tastes that much better when made with sugar?

Cool! I'll get to try some in May when a friend brings some over for me.

I was in Europe in 2000, and after three months in Spain, I had not had a Dr Pepper. A girl in our group was returning to California for a weekend to go to a wedding, and I asked her to bring me a Dr. Pepper. She bought the DP but forgot to bring it back to Spain with her.

I was disappointed but a few weeks later in Mallorca (a big British tourist area) I noticed DR PEPPER!!! It definitely didn't have the same taste but I noticed something else on the back.....

A PRUNE FLAVORED SODA

I was shocked to see this as I never associated the flavor w/ Dr Pepper and even looked on Snopes.com to debunk the rumor that prune juice is related to DP. (http://www.snopes.com/business/secret/drpepper.asp)

Well, when I went to London a few weeks later I noticed all the bottles had the same thing written on them. Questions:

Do they still have this on the bottles?
When did DP come to Europe? With the Cadbury acquisition?
Why did Cadbury think that this would make people want to buy it?

I heard a story of an Englishman who would take Dr Pepper w/ him to France because they don't sell it there. I am thinking that DP is new to the Europe scene.

Every country has different labeling laws. In the Netherlands Antioxidents are listed as being in Coca-Cola. I have seen Vegetable Extracts listed on some British beverages. In the US the term "Natural Flavorings" may be enough. It other countries they may need to be more explict.

[ 02-05-2005, 11:05 PM: Message edited by: bigrich ]

I don't recall ever seeing Prunes in the ingredients list on an English Dr Pepper. It has been available in England for years, although only from Coca-Cola since the 1990's. Before that it was imported from Holland.

I don't know about the rest of Europe but I remember when I bought my first Dr Pepper here in Sweden when I was a kid, it had just been released and I believe it was around 1985.