The world would be a much happier place if there were skeleton-shaped things in every food.
Spaghetti with skeleton meatballs. Pistachios with skull-shaped nuts inside every shell. Or here’s a really crazy one: chicken wings with actual bones in the middle!
Wait: one of those things is not quite like the others. But it doesn’t matter, because the point is that Kellogg’s newest Halloween cereal is Chocolate Frosted Flakes with Skeleton Marshmallows. It’s the logical next step up from this summer’s Frosted Flakes with Marshmallows, because when you’ve already paired a sugar-coated cereal with concentrated bits of sugar, the only way to make it sweeter for the sweetest season of the year is to add another glaze of corn syrupy malted cocoa.
At this rate, Kellogg’s will be selling Frosted Flakes with complimentary maple syrup bottles and sugar beet seeds in every box by the time Christmas comes around. Continue reading →
It’s September, which means I can finally start using the term “Halloweeny” in public without sounding like I’m talking about a cheddar hot dog that tragically came without any cheese filling. Though trust me: I will be making a lot of those crescent roll mummy Halloweiners.
So what better way to kick off the boo-na fide Halloween season than with everyone’s favorite spooky trilogy? No, I don’t mean a marathon session of all three I Know What You Did Last Summer movies: I’m talking about Count Chocula, Franken Berry, and Boo Berry cereals!
While these monster cereals have already been spotted in stores like Target, Big Lots, and Walgreens, I want to thank General Mills for generously sending me the spooker care package you see above, which contained the cereals themselves and so, so much more. I know what you’re thinking, and I agree. Couldn’t they have thought of more creative sequel names than I Still Know What You Did Last Summer and I’ll Always Know What You Did Last Summer?
But enough about murderous fishermen. Let’s start researching for an I Know What You Ate Last Autumn screenplay instead. Continue reading →
Deep breaths, Dan. It’s only August. It’s still not socially acceptable to wear a vampire costume into work, and if you try trick-or-treating tonight, you’ll be lucky to post bail by October 31st.
But oh, brother, is it hard to not get swept up in Halloween spirit already, especially when Kellogg’s latest press release announced their full Fall lineup, including the new Frosted Caramel Apple Pop-Tarts & Chocolate Frosted Flakes with Skeleton Marshmallows cereal seen above.
The lineup also includes the previously leaked Special K Pumpkin Spice Crunch and Pumpkin Spice Nutri-Grain Bars (maybe we’ll finally see a Nutri-Grain review on this blog?), and it also confirmed that Pumpkin Spice Frosted Mini-Wheats, Special K Apple Cinnamon Crunch, Pumpkin Pie Pop-Tarts, and Pumpkin Spice Fudge Stripes will all be returning this year.
But these two new, fruity and skeletal treats are easily the most exciting products of the bunch. All these snacks are hitting shelves this month, and I look forward to rapidly eating them to the point of satisfied nausea. Just like I did with my candy on Halloween night.
Back in April, I scored an exclusive photo of a Caramel Apple Pop-Tart, and now we have the box art to match the rumors. I commend Kellogg’s for choosing green Granny Smith apples for their neon icing drizzle (which reminds me of the carpet in a bowling alley) instead of Red Delicious, and I hope it brings a puckering, tart bite to pair with the sweet caramel.
The box art also confirms that the filling comes in ribboned shades of brown. I have no idea what the implications of this are, but I do know that come October, I’ll be filling an old-timey bucket with these pastries and bobbing for them while blindfolded.
As for Chocolate Frosted Flakes with Skeleton Marshmallows, they aren’t actually new so much as they are a Frankenstein combination of old cereal bits. Chocolate Frosted Flakes (also known as Choco Zucaritas) aren’t the easiest cereal to find on shelves, but they do exist. The skeleton marshmallows, meanwhile, made their debut last Halloween in Froot Loops and Apple Jacks.
I wasn’t terribly thrilled with normal Frosted Flakes with Marshmallows, but this cereal has me happily envisioning pillow cases full of Mallo Cups. Better yet, all I’d have to do is toss in Golden Grahams (and maybe a little liquid smoke) for a taste of late summer s’mores.
Cereal aside, I’m excited about the mail-in flashlights teased on the Frosted Flakes box. They appear to come in 4 varieties, with each beaming an image of Tony the Tiger, a Pop-Tart, our lovable Rice Krispies boys, or Toucan Sam. I hope we get to choose, because I’ve never wanted anything more than to fall asleep under the grinning glow of an iridescent, anthropomorphized toaster pastry.
It would take “sweet dreams” to a whole new level.
(Product images via Kellogg’s. And once again, special thanks to Candy Hunting for tipping me off about the photos.)
Forget about all those Clintons, Bernies, and floppy hair-dos: the real election you should care about involves the Count, Boo, and Frank. You’ll never hear the phrase “lesser of two evils” in this election, because every candidate is equally lovable and sweet.
Which is ironic, because all three are monsters.
That’s right: Count Chocula, Franken Berry, and Boo Berry Monster Cereals are coming back to shelves for Fall 2016, starting in late August. But this time they’re not just here to spook and entertain. They vant your vote. Even though it’s only August 1st, General Mills is making the sweaty dog days of summer howl like werewolves with their debut of MonstersVote2016.com: the online headquarters for the Monsters Cereal Election. Here you can vote, take alignment polls, read monster bios, download posters, and see a live map of nationwide vote distribution.
This is exciting enough to make me taste ghosts of Boo Berry in the back of my mouth (though that might be from my stockpile of 2015 boxes). Every four years, Halloween fans get sad when the American presidential race overshadows their favorite shadowy holiday. So props to General Mills for capitalizing on this capitalist ennui with a playful twist of Halloween spirit.
There’s a lot to talk about here, so allow me to take a deep breath and cancel that impulsive tattoo parlor appointment I made to get #FrankenBerry2016 inked on my forehead. Continue reading →
While we were all prancing about in the summer sun, hatching Pokémon eggs and frying enough real eggs on the scalding pavement to give Denny’s a run for their money, Kellogg’s silently let slip their first 2016 pumpkin spice breakfast product.
It’s Limited Edition Special K Pumpkin Spice Crunch, and Kellogg’s isn’t messing around with the pumpkin spice authenticity. Taking a spicy page from 2015’s Pumpkin Spice Frosted Mini-Wheats‘ ingredients list, Pumpkin Spice Crunch combines the rice and wheat Special K flakes we all know and love tolerate with nutmeg, allspice, ginger, and cinnamon clusters.
Always the pumpkin spice bridesmaid, cloves was unavailable for comment.
It looks like this Pumpkin Spice Special K uses the same type of soft, yogurt-ish clusters as last fall’s Special K Apple Cinnamon Crunch. Since that cereal was one of the season’s tastiest surprises, I’m already excited enough for Pumpkin Spice Crunch to paint a grinning jack-o-lantern on my stomach.
(My belly button will be the candle.)
Huge shoutout to our friends at Candy Hunting for the photo above. It was found on Influenster with no additional release date information, but given how much earlier pumpkin spice products are released each successive year, you should expect to see Special K Pumpkin Spice Crunch on shelves 3 days ago.
You’re 8 years old. You just finished a long night of successful trick-or-treating. You even remembered to avoid Old Lady Cruthers house. No way you were gonna fall for her candy/dental floss switcheroo this year! You take off your Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles headpiece and empty your pillowcase of loot onto the living room floor.
But to your gasping surprise, the only thing that comes out…is beans!
This is the stuff Halloween nightmares are made of, right? Well, maybe not: don’t smash all your jack-o-lanterns in disgust just yet, because Love Grown Foods has released the latest in their line of bean based cereals: Bats & Boos Chocolate & Vanilla. Continue reading →
Like a zombie rising from its grave, the burning hot, neon orange frosted pastry pops out of the toaster. It doesn’t groan, but it does sizzle. And it isn’t hungry to eat brains. No, it wants to be the one that gets eaten!
And I’m happy to oblige. Back again for 2015 are Spookylicious Pop-Tarts. They’re pretty much just regular Chocolate Fudge Pop-Tarts that have instead been frosted jack-o-lantern orange and sneezed on by some great, sprinkle-spewing monster. Surprisingly, this idea somehow beat out “Fergilicious Pop-Tarts,” which would have been equally scary. Continue reading →
I can think of no better way to start this review than with a ghost emoji. Okay, maybe if it was a blue ghost emoji (get your priorities straight, Apple!).
Now that Count Chocula and Franken Berry have had their time in the ethereal spotlight, we must complete the monster cereal trilogy (if only it were a quintilogy; we miss you, Fruit Brute, and Yummy Mummy!) by highlighting the mischievous blue specter himself: Boo Berry!
Unlike the Count’s chocolate fanaticism and Frank’s strong strawberry love, Boo Berry takes a more polygamist flavor approach. You would expect an outright claim to blueberry, but his cereal claims to simply be “berry” flavored. Rather than being deterred by this vagueness, I take it as an open invitation to interpret whatever wild Snozzberry or Islandberry flavors my imagination desires.
It’s like the cereal equivalent of an abstract painting! Continue reading →
