Customers at Chick-fil-A aren’t just there for the waffle fries and chicken sandwiches; most of them go for the drinks: the classic lemonade and sweet tea.
In a viral video posted on Oct. 4, TikToker Ceey (@slimeball.ceey) revealed what’s actually in the lemonade, shocking users as they thought the drink consisted of hand-squeezed lemons.
“Gonna show you how we make diet lemonade at Chick-fil-A,” he says in the clip.
The video has over 2.9 million views.
@slimeball.ceey now yk🤷🏾♂️ #fyp #foryou #viral #lemonade #cfa #chickfila #chickfilalemonade #clt ♬ original sound – drakelover
The worker begins by emptying a big pouch of lemon juice with pulp into a huge container and then pours a big bag of Splenda into the juice. After filling the container with water, the employee stirs for a few seconds.
According to Chick-fil-A’s site, the classic diet lemonade is made of three ingredients: real lemon juice—not from concentrate, Splenda No Calorie Sweetener, and water.
“And that’s the diet lemonade,” he says at the end of the clip.
In the comments section, users shared their opinions on what the lemonade recipe actually is.
“And here I thought you guys were squeezing lemons back there,” one user said.
“Damn! at the CFA I worked at, we juiced hundreds and hundreds of lemons a day! I came home every day super sticky from lemon juice & pulp everywhere!” another commented.
“Really could’ve went my whole life never knowing this,” a third user said.
In an updated comment in the comments section, Ceey shared that he got fired though it is unclear if he meant it as a joke in response to his post going viral.
In January 2022, another Chick-fil-A employee shared the lemonade recipe on TikTok. In a statement to Newsweek, Chick-fil-A responded regarding the debate over hand-squeezing the lemons.
“Chick-fil-A Lemonade is one of our most popular beverages, and to help ensure our lemonade is always available for our guests, we extract lemon juice outside of the restaurant using state-of-the-art equipment, which helps operators and their team members keep up with demand,” the statement read.
The Daily Dot reached out to Ceey via Instagram messaging and to Chick-Fil-A via email.
