ISSUE 57, DISCONTINUED PLEASURES, Part 2: A Cereal that Was
A Cereal That Was
I became a parent in 1990, so had to wrestle with the culinary terror that was breakfast cereal at the end of the 20th century. Like most conscientious parents, we were classicists when introducing our son the morning in a box. Cheerios. God’s oats. Classic O shape. Toasty and crisp to begin with and soft and inviting when soaked in milk. But we knew that television would soon be beaming visions of other cereals into my child’s brain. Calvin in the classic comic strip Calvin and Hobbes had a thing for “chocolate coated sugar bombs”—cutting to the chase in the food industry push to addict the population to sucrose, theobromine, caffeine, and whatever ingestible drug could be injected or pasted onto a wheat/oat/rice filler. The commercials were mind numbing for Flintstones Fruity Pebbles (Post), Count Chocula (General Mills), and for that strange line up of TV associated products that launched and bombed: Mr T’s, 3CPOs, Dino Pebbles, Breakfast with Barbie, Smurf Berry Chrunch, etc.
One can almost smile with satisfaction when these board room contrivances auger into the desert floor and blow up. But not everything created in the last 30 years has been drek. The maple tinged Waffle Crisp cereal launched in 1996 with the shape of mini-waffles was way superior in flavor to the May-po maple flavored cereal of my youth. The crunch was satisfying, and it had a kind of country retro vide. So its cancelation in 2018 was met by consternation and a campaign by its legion of fans for its reinstatement in the Post line-up of offerings. Since it is always less expensive to revive a cereal with an established fan base that launch a new product, Post has acquiesced and is returning Waffle Crisp to its line-up.
After a childhood in sugarless post-War Japan I came to the United States just after the introduction of Sugar Frosted Flakes. I was horrified by the flavor. So you can tell that my tastes were shaped at moment of transition in cereal history when the old school Grape Nuts, Raisin Bran, Cheerios, Shredded Wheat, and Kellogg’s Cornflakes were being supplanted by the first generation of sugary items: Corn Pops, Lucky Charms, Fruit Loops, and Sugar Frosted Flakes. In my family the one new wave cereal that got traction was Life, which my mother loved. My early inclination was entirely old school—with shredded Wheat being my favorite, and tolerance for all others except puffed rice which tasted like Styrofoam before Styrofoam.
Now I rarely eat cereal, having opted for pre-1890s things like hominy grits, biscuits, sausage, fruit, and eggs. Which puts me in mind of recent odd developments such as the Maple Bacon Donut Cereal touted by Mr. Breakfast.com I call that the Tim Horton in honor of the Canadian donut chain that is a quasi-religion in the North.
“Bacon good enuff it don’t need no donut.”