Don't Be Fooled By The Taste: Fireball Isn't Just a Bottle of Antifreeze, Says Fireball
But the seed has been planted in the brains of consumers.
Fireball, the cinnamon-flavored whisky that recently played a starring role in a GoPro wedding video, has been pulled from store shelves abroad for containing too much of a chemical that’s also found in antifreeze.
Finland, Sweden and Norway have nixed Fireball over the level of propylene glycol in it, though here in the US, you can still buy it at your leisure. Usually, the formula for Fireball that’s sent to Scandinavia doesn’t contain this chemical. But a batch accidentally shipped.
Here in the US, the chemical is allowed and people have been drinking it liberally up to this point. But if there are a number of countries raising a red flag, it might prompt people to reconsider those nasty shots.
Fireball has gotten so popular in the US that earlier this year, it was reportedly outselling Jameson whiskey and Patron Tequila. It’s changing the game so much that it’s driving a flavored whiskey — and specifically, cinnamon flavored whiskey — trend.
So negative press could ding the company, Sazerac’s, financial results.
“PG is a regularly used and perfectly safe flavoring ingredient,” Sazerac writes in a press release. “PG has been used in more than 4,000 food, beverage, pharmaceutical and cosmetic products for more than 50 years.Most people consume PG every day in soft drinks, sweeteners, some foods or alcoholic beverages.” It goes on to note that the FDA gives the ingredient the OK (in small doses).
Even with this reassurance, people tend to have issues with consuming chemicals frequently found in items that we’re not supposed to be eating. Case in point: Subway and the case of the yoga mat bread. People had been eating footlongs like they were going out of style for a while. But the second they found out exactly what it was they were eating, they weren’t happy. Subway had to launch a campaign to let everyone know that they were serious about that whole “Eat fresh” thing.
So that might be what needs to happen here in the US for Fireball as well. It’s bad enough that this liquor takes like a hot glass of gross. That taste coupled with this news kind of makes you think that you’re literally drinking toxins. Fans will need to know, without a doubt, that they can go back to GoProing their swigs of Fireball without being poisoned.
