Food Theory: Santa Made Sprite! 

This is one of those episodes I’ll keep coming back to to watch again and again to learn every bit of information that is in the video. Very informative, interesting and fun, like all of your theories Mat! I can’t count all the times I’ve been able to comment in a conversation with facts I learn from your videos. Tangential learning at it’s finest! Merry Christmas everyone! Stay safe and have a happy new year!

You know Coca Cola is persistent when they still advertise tf out of their products during The Great Depression

As a German, I have never, EVER, heared of anybody hiding a pickle in the christmas tree XD

I feel like if mat started a History theory channel it would be pretty interesting making theories about unsolved mysteries or things that has happened in general, Its probably too different than the kind of theories we are used to but it could be cool

As a European, I can say that with us (Belgium and I believe the Netherlands too), Saint Nicholas is a holy man that, just as you said, visits december 6th to leave presents. The days leading up, children can put their shoe next to the fireplace with a present either for him, his assistant or his horse for a little gift of chocolate, spiced biscuits or tangerines. In Dutch, his name is 'Sinterklaas'.

Food Theory educating me on, not only the theories that I never knew existed, but also its answers. Thank you.

All of the detailed Santa lore is really neat, but I'm also blown away by the fact that Sprite is actually lemon Fanta.

MatPat I actually had no idea that other people did the whole "hide a pickle ornament on a tree" because ever since I was little my mom always put a pickle on the tree and whoever found it, got to open gifts first.

Story time related to Santa : When i was in kindergarten on Christmas day, the teachers always invited Santa. They used the loudest sound effects that shows Santa's sleigh has landed in front of our school. Younger me only knew Santa, but they introduced zwater piets as well and i was confused. Turns out they're job was to stuffed bad children inside a giant bag that is similar to Santa's. Younger me was extremely terrified of Santa and zwater piets. I remember i actually saw one of the students held hostage and of course being stuffed into the bag in the process, idk what they did but that actually scared me.

It's unfortunate that you missed out the connection with "Father Christmas", a jolly character who represented the spirit of christmas, and eventually got merged with St Nicholas at some point a few hundred years ago. A lot of Santa's traits come from Father Christmas. Santa is still often called "Father Christmas" in the UK.

Christmas in Russia is completely different from that in the United States and Europe. For New Years is the mega holiday in Russia. This time of year the trees are put up and decorated and presents are given under the tree by Ded Moroz or Father Winter. The Slavic equivalent of Santa Claus. He is the symbol of the Russian winter and he is often accompanied by a young woman which is his granddaughter named Snegurochka.

4:06 liking kids isn't recognised as solely a nice thing matpat...

Perfect thing to watch on Christmas Eve... Thanks Matpat! My dream is out the window!

Fun fact. Coca Cola's sales crash every year around christmas in Sweden. Since we have a local thing called "Must" that we just consume milions of liters of during christmas and easter. So coca cola just gave up and made their own brand of must for the Swedish market. The coke sales just go down by 50% for like 2-3 months a year.

Funny you should mention Haddon Sundblom, because he was the son of a Finnish immigrant and his image of Santa Claus would be shaped by the Nordic version of him and not the Southern European version of St. Nicholas. The Finnish version of Santa Claus is based on Joulupukki. The literal translation means "Yule goat", but is most often depicted as man in on a broad red coat that travels from farm to farm in a small sleigh pulled by a reindeer. He is believed to have a pagan origin and might predate St.Nicholas. Given that Sundblom grew up with this image of Santa Claus, it is more likely that he based his illustrations the redcoat man pulled by reindeer then a Turkish catholic saint. Edit: Thought reading about Joulupukki, he wasn't generally considered a nice guy. He usually entered a house asking "Is there any nice children here?" and if it wasn't...well, those kids were in mortal danger. He also demanded appeasements. Not milk and cookies, but more in line of real food and beer. So I guess He and St. Nicholas at some point did a Goku/Vegeta Fusion and became the Santa we know today.

3:28 St Nicholas saved the pickle boys! 💃

Hey MatPat! So I just wanted to thank you for making me smile, laugh, and unbored myself with your content. Ever since I showed my dad the "The dark secret of Oreos" video, he hasn't stopped watching this channel. As I'm writing this he's watching the Doritos video! And I've NEVER seen him this interested in something I watch. So I think for fathers day I'm going to get him merch because he also loves the merch. So I wish you a Happy New Years and Merry Late Christmas! Love and Health for this new year! From the Perez Family.

You should do a video to see if Santa can survive all the cookies he would consume.

The "Saint nick left money in women's shoes" thing has kinda remained. In some european countries children leave out their shoes and get chocolate coins, presents and other treats in them.

The hidden gem in this video from Food Theory's animators: the rotating 2d image of sprite boy is actually also a sprite (an animation technique popular in early video games).

4:26 because they were ho ho hungover

Me: **reads the title that Santa made sprite** Oh, okay, this seems interesting The video: **starts talking about coke** Me: wait what

5:41 Third pic along - That's not Santa, that's the Ghost of Christmas Present! You're cheating! :D

I have a pickle in my Christmas tree. You ain’t alone, MatPat

As a fan of Puppet History, I’m glad Matpat brought up the pickle bois

I’m so glad that someone else has the Christmas pickle tradition, I started it two years ago when I found a Christmas pickle in a dollar store with the story attached , now I just hide multiple ones through the house for fun

You know MatPat, you go on about being addicted to Diet Coke, but, since before my memories formed and I came into consciousness, I have *loved* Sprite. I’ve since moved to Sprite Zero, but it tastes the exact same to me. So to find out where the name comes from is truly a gift I needed.

The fact Coca-Cola advertised during The Great Depression shows how determined they were

As a german I can say for sure: The christmas pickle is absolutely unknown in germany :)

Idk why, but Santa to me is a very jolly character, despite the whole "he stalks you" and "he breaks into your literal house". I guess its because my christmas tree was placed outside and not inside of my house and the whole "he delivers presents!" thing covered up like 90% of the stuff. Also my parents never told me that he lived in the north pole, his elves make toys for him without paying them and the infamous "Naughty List" (they did tell me that you have to be nice but never told me that there was a entire list dedicated to it :/).

Back when I was little and believed in Santa, other children often told me Coca Cola invented Santa Claus. And even when I did not believe in him anymore, I heard that many many times throughout my life. But since being little I knew it wasn't true. I knew that St. Nicolaus was a very old myth and I thought people knew Santa even before Coca Cola made him a mascot. And now I know there were Santa ads way before Coca Cola did it. Thanks for proving me right, Mat. But I could never thought what you show the origin was. xD

In the netherlands we have a nather holiday selebrating saint nick (sinterklaas) where he leaves pressents in the shoes of children so i guess holyday came from 2:47

Another St. Nick legend (my personal favorite) goes that at the Council of Nicaea (a big church event that discussed the teachings of the church), St. Nick got so upset at the false teachings of a teacher named Arius (who was teaching that Jesus was a creation of God, rather than God Himself as the church taught at the time) that he got up, walked over to Arius and straight up punched the dude. Gives a brand new meaning to "deck the halls." 🤣

I love how there might be kids who still believe in santa and MatPat just says: - "SANTA HAS BEEN DEAD FOR 1800 YEARS AND HE WAS INVENTED BY SOME GUY WHO CRITICISED THE GOVERNMENT" Pardon my bad orthography

We do the pickle thing to. I was always told it xame from the German side of the family. We also celebrate St. Nicholas Day on December 6, leaving out shoes outside our bedroom door for small gifts, chocolate and oranges. I knew that the dowry thing was the reason for the shoes; I like your explanation of the pickles

10:47 ofcourse matpat is from ohio...

Hey MatPat! I was watching the old Kindergarten 2 live streams and y'all about the food fight that happens in the game and the aerodynamics of different common lunch foods. I'd love to see a theory about: 1) what's the best food to grab in a food fight, and 2) how hard would you have to throw the item for it to be deadly?

Food theory suggestion: What are the most optimized toppings and flavors for froyo. Froyo is priced by weight so you could figure out what toppings and flavors can get to 500 calories with the least weight

Mattpad always tell the best thoeries, it always makes my day when there's a new theory with ANY theorists explaining.

In Belgium and the Netherlands we have Sinterklaas, who's also based on Sint Nicolas. He is so called from Spain, has helpers, and gives presents, chocolate and mandarins. You can say he's the Dutch version of Santa.

My family always hides a pickle in our tree. I love that tradition!

In the netherland we celebrate sinterklaas ( sint nicolaas ) and one of the traditions we have is putting our shoes near a chimney and wait overnight, the next morning there would be a small gift in the shoe, but i never knew it came from a old legend where nicolaas would put money in the shoes of lady's.

Every body always ask: Did Santa made Sprite? But nobody ask: How did Santa made Sprite.

we always celebrated saint nick, always got a fruit in our stockings + we did the pickle ornament in the tree but whoever found it got to open their present first

5:50 actually, "Russian Santa" is a completely different folklore character, with no connection to St. Nicholas. His name is "Ded Moroz" (translates Grandpa Freezing) and he just represents winter or cold. No saints here)

I have never in my life heard of the "hide a pickle in a tree" tradition but it actually sounds hilarious

Happy New Year theorist :D

Love Christmas! Always have, never heard about hiding the pickle in the tree!!! New tradition

Saint Nicholas was a Greek living in Anatolia in his time still part of the roman empire his parents were Greek and in the western parts of Anatolia lived primarily Greeks in those times so I would guess his skin tone would be Mediterranean perplection just like current day greeks and he didn’t save the girls from slavery but from prostitution although you could say it somewhat resembles it

3:18 Hey im from germany and i cant remember anyone having this Tradition

3:48 Santa is looking bright today

Happy new year!!!

I would love to see a video calculating the caloric content of Lembas bread (from Lord of the Rings) and comparing it to real food options

I love how matpat gets to the topic from title at 10:37

the premise of this theory is giving "deadpool is Ernest Hemingway" vibes and I. Am. HERE FOR IT!

thank you for always bringing new and exciting ideas to the table! ️

"What is the relationship between Santa and coke?" How else did you think he could stay up long enough to deliver all those presents? And don't get me started on how much the elves go through in a year.

1:30 Oh, Mat you got it all wrong. Krampus isn't an evil elf at all. ... he's a literal demon.

Your videos need to be part of the public school curriculum. The videos are easy to follow and all the information fits together satisfyingly like a puzzle. I also love the parts where I can say I knew that, culminating in so many “aha” and “so that’s why/how now I get it” moments. Looking forward to more of the MatPat awesomely explains the history of the world series.👏🏽👍🏼🥳🇺🇸

I do the pickle thing too!!! Everyone thinks it’s soooo weird. I’m glad you do it that’s reassuring!

I thought my grandma made up that pickle in the tree thing. I approve of this, and the theory.

Honestly I was expecting the Food theory episode on Santa to be on whether Santa could survive on eating all those milk and cookies. If you see this MatPat then do a video on this please!

As someone whom I've called myself 'Santa' in media and games, who enjoys Christmas, born in December, and most importantly really love Coca Cola. So after watching this video and just realizing why coke is so inline with Christmas every year, this is really surprising to me.

As I understand it there was also some inspiration drawn from the nordic house gnome and Santa slowly evolved from a tiny grey man into what we see today. There was a Swedish illustrator named Jenny Nyström that at least formed the Swedish image of Santa and she had a similar transition in her art.

Wow, wish I had seen this video when I was doing a speech on Coca-Cola advertising and marketing. I knew some of the details already, but I never new Santa’s design was from a political drawing. The amount of research you put towards this video is admirable. Thanks for another great video.

3:00 Awww Saint Nicholas found the pickle boys

When I was a kid my grandparents would hide a pickle ornament in their tree and anytime me and the rest of the kids were over whenever we found it, we got a gift. I loved that so much

Food theory idea: How many cups of koolaid can you drink without something bad happening? I mean: Getting sick, throwing up, ect ect.

Not even 10 seconds in I'm convinced that it's just Mat just wanting another reason to drink more pop.

You hide pickles too?! I thought that was just my family, that’s awesome!

To be honest hiding murder victims in a vat of pickles is one of the worst places to put them, because the pickles will actually sort of semi embalm them

This is some fascinating history, learning how Santa developed before Coca Cola got a hold of him is such a spectacular way for things to line up for them.

As a Sprite fan, this brings a smile to my face.

"more of a skin tone to Osama Bin Laden than Coca Cola's Santa Claus" Well that's a sentence I wasn't expecting to hear this Christmas! FA LA LA LA LA! LA LA LA LA!

9:50 Oh, where i live in Brazil we have those trucks on the streets when it's close to christmas! I always go outside to see them!

About the pickle - my grandparents emigrated from Germany to the US and we always did the pickle thing growing up. I thought it was their tradition from Germany that we continued. I do it for my kids every year.

4:50 he looks more like the janitor from kindergarten also am i the only one that's never heard of coke in relation to christmas

I have never once in my entire life until this video heard of hiding a pickle in an Xmas tree.

Yoo, my family always did the pickle ornament tradition every year. It was awesome.

6:33 so, uh... eheh, uh, did anyone else just stop at this point to check which channel they’re on? Cuz, let me tell ya! This did NOT feel like “Food Theory” at all!

I used to do the pickle thing at school, the librarian would hide it incredible well. We also celebrate St. Nicolas day on December 6. We get chocolate, a Christmas tree ornament, sometimes some assorted nuts, and a random other thing.

I want on April Fools day for Mat to say "Bone Apple Tea" and see if anyone realizes it

We do the pickle in my family too. The gift is usually a joke.

I also used to find the pickle in the Christmas tree. I didn't get an extra present though, it was just a fun thing to do every day. I think my parents also said it was from Germany.

3:12 You are not the only one who did the hide the pickle game, my family did it every year. and I always would find it first every year. =]

4:43 more like he sees you and he's creepin ;D

These are the kinds of videos that lead me down an hour of Wikipedia searches and me not even finishing the video. I respect that.

Thank you I finally got the answer to this question

I’m surprise you didn’t talk about Saint Nicholas punching a heretic in the face. It’s my favorite Christmas story.

“What’s the relationship between Santa and coke?” You’ll learn when you’re older Matt.

Ooooh shout out to the Sea of Thieves chimney, would be cool seeing a game theory on SoT.

Someday matpat is probably gonna say of how pizza is a brain controlling fungus that will control us.

In Russia hes Blue because hes "Father Frost" and comes from Slavic Mythology. Later ofc he was kinda mixed with Santa i believe.

Just throwing this out there, I personally would totally buy a multi-theory phone case, poster, pjs, travel mug, and pen set. Y’know, just in case anyone was looking for merch or design ideas 😉

Food theory idea: If every grocery stores close down for a month, what would you do to survive?

Im flemish and we celebrate sint nicholas day on december 6th kids put out their shoes with a carrot (for his horse) a beer (for his helpers de pieten) and a glass of water milk or wine for sint nicholas himself often the kds place their shoes in front of a chimney because sint nicholas jumps trough the chimney to get you your gifts , the next morning the kids wake up to find the carrot eaten the beer and other beverage finished and their gifts . Sint nicholas is also known for leaving a bunch of chocolate cookies and mandarins along with the gifts :)

MatPat, the Turks didn’t enter that part of the world until the 11th century. The Eastern Roman Empire ruled over modern day Turkey. Nicholas could be a mix of Greek, Syrian, Armenian, or something else. But not Turkish.

Matt makes such quality videos, it’s actually crazy how well edited each video is

Could you please PLEASE bake a salt cake? In master chef season 5 ep 18, Leslie supposedly baked a salt cake that cost him the round and his chance to win. How ever it is a hotly debated decision bc not only did the show not show such incident (like they would normally do) , but the judges didn’t spit it out or anything. The behavior of everyone was off . Even Leslie, when he had to admit it. So maybe it was a hoax created by the show. So my challenge to you is to bake a salt cake and test the viewers’ theory . As explained in the links below, can a salt cake even look soft and fluffy. Would it be edible at all? Would the chemistry is a salt cake be different from its sugar counter part? So you have the visual test, the stability test (can it hold, what about crumbs, etc) , and you have the the actual cooking/ baking. As in could you actually accidentally do that. Would a season chef/ baker like Leslie make that mistake or would he know something was off from the beginning (like in knives out , when the nurse knew she picked up the right vial bc of the weight ). Chemistry vs television. Is it possible ? Who is right? I think it would make a great ep and I would love to know the answer ! Below in the link , it’s suggested that even using salted vs unsalted butter or an extra 1/4 tsp of salt would have made a notable difference in baking. Something so small. Is that true, if so how could a whole cup and a half go unnoticed. Questions questions qu3tions and you might give us all an answer. 😁 interested…? www.reddit.com/r/Masterchef/comments/rn4ibl/leslie_from_masterchef_reveals_the_truth_about/ www.reddit.com/r/LivestreamFail/comments/rn0qgj/leslie_from_masterchef_reveals_the_truth_about/

Honestly, I was thinking of Coke Cola this Christmas but not because of Santa. I kept on thinking about polar bears and their relationship with coke cola ads