EDitorial ± 29-Oct-2002

Get The Balance Right

Sitting down to a bowl of Nesquik "chocolate flavour toasted rice & corn cereal", as I was this very morning, I'd have had some difficulties labelling this as the most important meal of the day. And the enclosed Men In Black II free Flingon was a let-down too: remember do not throw at people or animals!

It can't have been too long ago that breakfast was a largely savoury though joyless affair. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for a helping of porridge at times, provided there's a tin of Golden Syrup nearby, but with salt?! No wonder there are some dour-looking faces north of the border.

Not that he'll remember, but my mate Adam observed a while back that cereals seemed to be increasing in sugar content. At that time one particular brand (can't ... remember ... name) offered marshmallow pieces among the corn-based crunchy bits. Nowadays we have such delights as:

  • mini chocolate Weetabix: truly the brand has no dignity left
  • chocolate coated Frosties, from Tony the toothless Tiger
  • Bart Simpson's No ProblemOs: frosted loops and choccy biscuits

Enjoy with ice cold milk as an indulgent cereal or try as a dessert with ice cream or yoghurt - simply delicious on its own as a snack

Then, in M&S t'other day scouting for cinnamon & raisin bagels, a product line that's gone the way of Shergar, I stumbled across their Chocolate Decadence Crunchy Cereal:

Crunchy cereal with milk chocolate coated honeycomb pieces, white and dark chocolate curls, milk chocolate coated cornflakes and white and dark chocolate covered raisins

That "decadence" tag is well chosen, don't you think? Maybe this is a kind of postmodern foodstuff (guess who read an article on Umberto Eco recently), having no more than a tenuous link to the traditional concept of breakfast while recognising that no-one really has time for it anymore. But hey, enough of my yakkin'.

NB I'm confident that this is the exact wording on the pack 'cos I felt obligated, purely in the name of research, to buy some today. I may follow the serving suggestion and stick the entire contents in a knickerbocker glory glass. Oink!

If You Take Away With You Nothing Else

Guess the cereal from the box-top description:

  1. puffed wheat coated with sugar and honey, fortified with vitamins and iron
  2. delicious boulders of wheat and honey
  3. whole wheat malted cereal

Be seeing you!

Ed