Ever heard the phrase “like a kid in a candy store?” Well you should see a cereal and Pop-Tart blogger in Kellogg’s headquarters.
Earlier this month, I was generously invited to tour Kellogg’s command center in Battle Creek, Michigan. And from the minute I stepped into their twinkling castle of brick and glass, I had to resist every urge to swoon head over heels like a ’50s sitcom romantic.
With a colorful Kellogg’s timeline on the wall, a dedicated Eggo Waffle showcase, a 24-hour cereal bar in full view, and an overhead Snap, Crackle, and Pop banner so large it’d put Citizen Kane to shame, this place was pretty much a cereal Xanadu.
But that was just the beginning: as the kind brand marketer and PR representative who led my tour quickly assured me, I would soon be traveling through Kellogg’s past, as well as its present. Continue reading →
If you squint, it almost actually looks sort of a little like Santa Claus.
I just wanted to take this chance to formally wish you all a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays, from both me and ol’ Crunch Kringle up there. I’m eternally thankful for all you readers who make this site worth writing for—especially those of you dedicated enough to check Cerealously on Christmas!
It’s a welcome week of relative relaxation for all of us, but rest assured I’ll be furiously taste testing and tip-tapping within days: from bite-sized Girl Scout cookies to spicy gravel, there are a lot of great cereals on the horizon.
So whether you spend this day making Cap’n Crunch chicken strips,* mowing down gingerbread men, or just chilling by the fire—the coziest oxymoron—make it a merry one. If you need something to read over breakfast, second breakfast, or the much-beloved “midnight breakfast,” here’s a collection of this winter’s hottest reviews so far: some are from me, others are from friends of the site.
(Update, 12/26: Now that Cereal Time has sadly concluded, I plan to write a tribute to the series soon. Stay tuned!)
Warm the hearth, light up the tree, and fill a bowl of Cap’n Crunch with eggnog (it’s the holidays, you’ve earned it!).
Why? Because we’re unwrapping the four latest video presents in cereal wise man Gabe Fonseca’s YouTube series: Cereal Time! Every Cereal Time episode is stuffed with more fun and nostalgia than a re-gifted fruit cake is stuffed with…who knows what, because I’m not eating it. And this latest series of episodes is sure to make you merrier than a nativity scene salesman who received a surplus shipment of Jesus’s mother figurines.
Thank you, I’ll be here all week.
But enough Biblical puns: let’s have some cereal fun! Continue reading →
This ain’t Cheerios’s first time ’round the berry block.
In fact, it isn’t even their third, fourth, or, fifth. On this teetering cusp of 2016–2017, General Mills new Very Berry Cheerios has hit shelves, and it’s the sixth berry-flavored (arguably the seventh) Cheerios to every grace America’s fruit-loving taste buds. Let’s count ’em off, kids: buckle your seatbelts and grab those lottery numbers, because we’re going back 13 years in time. Continue reading →
Wait a minute, that’s not how that goes, does it? Well either way, this surprise sighting of a Keebler Cereal at a Marc’s grocery store in Ohio still has me going cuckoo with excitement like a varsity jacket-wearing cartoon bird.
Not much is known about the cereal yet. The box promises “Real Mini Chocolate Chip Cookies,” but packaging genuine, fully baked dough spheres made of butter, brown sugar, egg, and chocolate chip seems like a logistical nightmare. I’m not saying I don’t believe in Ernie and Co.’s elven magic, but it seems equally likely that the “Real” in “Real Mini Chocolate Chip Cookies” is just referring to how really really mini they are.
Plus there appear to be plain chocolate spheres alongside the cookie pieces. Are these meant to be brownies? Burnt cookies? Raw E.L. Fudge innards? Only Ernie and a lucky Ohioan breakfast fan know at the moment—the rest of us will have to nibble our Fudge Stripes in anticipation until Keebler Cereal’s full debut.
And speaking of Fudge Stripes, this isn’t Keebler’s first foray into the crunchy cookie game. Their aptly named Keebler Cookie Crunch combined the flavors of Fudge Stripes and Chips Deluxe into a single 2008 cereal. Perhaps this new cereal will take after Keebler’s new Cookie Dough Bites, and every piece will be—dare I say it—actually doughy.
Big thanks to Junk Banter for passing along this news and photo. I’m sure he and I will both be eating enough of this stuff to fill a Hollow Tree soon enough. If you’d like to share a fresh cereal scoop, click yourself right on over to our submissions page, or just email us at cerealously.net@gmail.com. There’s a good chance your picture could be featured on the site.
‘Twas the night before Christmas, and all ’round the ring, not a creature was suplexing: not even a mouse.
I don’t have the time nor the professional wrestling knowledge to finish that entire parody poem, but just know that it would’ve involved Santa dropping the People’s Elbow down the chimney.
For all the wrasslin’ fans in your life, WWE & The New Day have just released the most perfect and edible holiday gift imaginable. Well, aside from maybe a peanut butter-stuffed, chocolate Hulk Hogan statue. Get on that, Reese’s! It’s Booty Ho-Ho-O’s cereal, and it’s a Decemberized edition of Big E, Kofi Kingston, and Xavier Woods’ cult favorite Booty O’s cereal.
Now, my wrestling knowledge starts and ends with old YouTube videos of The Boogeyman eating worms. So as usual, I’ll defer to cereal ringmaster Gabe Fonseca’s Booty O’s explanation video to catch you up on the lore:
Speaking of Gabe, he generously provided the above photo of Booty Ho-Ho-O’s. I’m glad he bought a box, because this fully licensed cereal can run you anywhere from $11–$30, depending on whether you buy it from f.y.e. stores, the WWE store, eBay, or that shady fella behind the abandoned cinema who smells a little too much like stale Fudgsicles to be trusted about his Limited Edition cereal scalping prices.
According to Gabe, Booty Ho-Ho-O’s taste exactly the same as their less-merry ancestors, but they do include three reworked marshmallows: golden North Stars, chevron-shaped green Holiday Cheer, and cloudy purple Holiday Magic. These appear to just be Booty O’s’ old marbits renamed for the season, but something about the idea of eating raw, unadulterated holiday energy gets me unnecessarily excited anyway.
I want to carry around a bag of Holiday Cheer and Holiday Magic marbits to throw at every Grinch, Scrooge, and un-marshmallowed bowl of cereal I pass. Not even my leftover Count Chocula stockpile will be safe.
A big thanks to Gabe for sharing his picture. If you’d like to give us a photographic gift of your own, click yourself right on over to our submissions page, or just email us at cerealously.net@gmail.com. There’s a good chance your picture could be featured on the site.
For every buzz-worthy Christmas Crunch and Cinnamon Star Crunch, there are plenty of less-exciting, non-Crunch based limited edition products that make grocery shelves a little merrier from the rough period of November 1st to December 31st. So while the Cap’n and those cannibalistic stars will get plenty of time in the breakfast spotlight, I want to give a shoutout to two of the little guys.
Or in the case of Rice Krispies with Holiday Colors, three of the little guys. Snap, Crackle, and Pop’s annual offering of red and green-speckled Rice Krispies is back again for 2016, returning silently to breakfast aisles in the night like a rice-stuffed Christmas present.
That’s what the song “Silent Night” is all about, right?
I “reviewed” (translation: “played with”) Holiday Rice Krispies last year, and I encourage you all to use this cereal to make your holiday season a little holiday-ier. You could make candy cane-shaped Rice Krispies Treats like the box recommends, or you could cover a snowball entirely in Rice Krispies and chuckle as innocent passerby unknowingly bite into an Ice Krispies Treat.
Quaker’s “Limited Edition” Maple Brown Sugar Oatmeal may seem like a cop-out, as it’s just their (arguably) most famous flavor repackaged with a charming living room Christmas tree scene. I mean, they could have at least tossed in some pine nuts, right?
But I’m going to stay positive and express my love for this holiday oatmeal. I couldn’t imagine a more cozy, warm scene than the one Quaker lovingly immortalized here in cardboard. And they picked the perfect, warmly cozy flavor to pair it with.
This Maple Brown Sugar Oatmeal is just ho-ho-wholesome, and I look forward to eating it from a novelty Rudolph mug while sprawled flat on my belly under my own tree. There’s a 100% chance I’ll be reading old Garfield comics while I do it, too.
If you’ve spotted any cool limited edition breakfast products, let us know! Click yourself right on over to our submissions page, or just email us at cerealously.net@gmail.com. There’s a good chance your picture could be featured on the site.
I know it’ll be hard to work a bowl of your favorite breakfast cereal into this day of turkey, green bean casserole, and yams glazed with some magic syrup your grandma must’ve bartered with Zeus to obtain, so I won’t blame you if you go breakfast-lite today.
But I’ll also give you six words: Cap’n Crunch in the mashed potatoes.
Regardless of how many Crunchberries find their way into today’s turducken, those of us gestating through day-long food comas can still celebrate cereal’s spirit by gobbling down the latest 5 episodes of cereal pilgrim Gabe Fonseca’s Cereal Time YouTube series. Every episode is a feast for the senses, as Gabe nostalgically waxes on the past and future of a different cereal each week.
I apologize for stuffing so many episode recaps into a single post, but hey—it is the season of stuffing.
