Mark Pendergrast publishes secret Coke formula

Safely guarded in an air-conditioned vault in Atlanta, Georgia, lies one of western society's most valuable artefacts. So valuable, that its owner could lose millions if anyone so much as got a look at it. That's what Coca-Cola would have us believe anyway , claiming the only original copy of the soft drink's top-secret recipe lies underneath its US headquarters. But one man is threatening to lift this veil of secrecy this week as he claims to publish a copy of the original formula in a new book. Historian Mark Pendergrast says the recipe was handed down through the family of Frank Robinson, the commercial partner of chemist John Pemberton, who first produced the drink in the summer of 1886.In the third edition of his book, For God, Country and Coca-Cola: The Definitive History of the Great American Soft Drink and the Company That Makes It', Pendergrast reproduces what he claims to be the same recipe that Pemberton devised over 125 years ago. Among the ingredients in the book are sugar, lime juice, nutmeg and coriander.