I'm a huge cereal fan. I don't care if it's Count Chocula or Shredded Wheat, I love pretty much every single variety you could possibly ever mention. That said, few things cereal-related bum me out more than all the cereals I remember loving as a kid that I'll never be able to have anymore. Imagine, a junk food product you had that you'll NEVER HAVE AGAIN. I still remember the taste of some of these, how depressing.
You probably didn't have to be a Star Wars kid to appreciate these. I remember getting a sweet Stormtrooper mask that I cut out from the back of the box, though. The best way I can describe these would be a cross between Honey Nut Cheerios and Life Cereal. Totally unique and awesome taste that I still remember vividly.
Remember how I talked about loving "old people" cereals like Shredded Wheat? Well, this wasn't bland or anything like that, but it was marketed towards old people for sure. It tasted almost like oatmeal cookies or something, VERY delicious. Apparently this is still sold in the US.
LOVED this one. What was cool about Fruit n' Fibre was that there were about six different varieties with totally different fruit mixtures. The dehydrated apples were REALLY delicious and there was a peach variety. Peach-flavored cereal? Totally wacky, but really good. Supposedly still sold in in the UK.
I wasn't a huge fan of these, but they were good. Mostly it was just funny that EVERY cereal had to have marshmallows at some point or other. For another example:
So every cereal had marshmallows in it during the 1980s, only we had maybe 5% of the fat kids you see around today. Man, that's wacky.
Here's another one I really miss. Not only did it have marshmallows, they were covered in chocolate. Chocolate being the ideal breakfast food, right? I'm almost positive these were pulled in the late 80s over concerns that cereals marketed towards children were far too sugary. Obviously this was one of the worst examples you could ever find (notice the similarities between this cereal and "Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs" from Calvin and Hobbes). Personally, I think the true target market of this cereal would have been the college stoner crowd, but what do I know?
Okay, here's the weird thing about Fruity Pebbles: they still exist in their original form in the US, but were completely revamped in the late 1980s in Canada. I told this story to people for years, swearing that Fruity Pebbles had been changed somewhere along the way, but nobody ever listened to me. I think this is half of the reason why I grew up so bitter. Anyway, the original Fruity Pebbles looked like multi-coloured Special K and were awesome. Around 1988 or 1989, the Canadian Pebbles were changed to be puffs along the lines of Trix (only nowhere near as good). They eventually petered out in the mid-90s, probably because of how lackluster they were. I think the Canadian government cracked down harder than the US on sugary cereals and since this one was successful, Post decided to just revamp it instead of discontinuing it like Rocky Road. Luckily, the US version is still going strong and I try to get my in-laws to bring back boxes of the stuff whenever they come back from Florida (along with Apple Jacks, natch).
Another Canada-related story concerned a cereal based on Disney's Gummi Bears cartoon. This cereal was simple: it was all Crunch Berries. You know the Cap'n Crunch Crunch Berries cereal? Probably not if you're from Canada because we only got it in limited-time-only runs from time to time. Anyway, if you had a bowl of only the berries from that cereal, that's what this was. Sugary to the point of being ridiculous, but awesome. I thought I was the only person that remembered this until the Internet came along, but there isn't even a box to verify.
I remember my older sister having these around and loving them, but they were gone as of maybe 1986. Sometimes I'll taste some other fruit-flavored cereal and get a hint of the Strawberry Shortcake flavour in there. REALLY good, I miss these and wish they'd bring them back since they're marketing the toys to kids again.
I remember having these, but no recollection of what they actually tasted like. It's just awesome that EVERYTHING had to have a cereal in the 1980s.
Even Mr. T! These were simple, they were just Cap'n Crunch in T shapes.
Easy: just Golden Grahams with chocolate and marshmallow pieces added to juice up our sugar intake. These were good, though.
'I really miss these, they were just awesome. Two flavours: chocolate chip and vanilla, each with its own box. Didn't stick around too long (that damn sugar ban), but man.... awesome.
This was actually an early-90s cereal, but they were still awesome. Each piece had either grape, cherry or orange stuff inside and some had nothing. The "hidden treasure" was what kind of gunk you'd get in each.
Some examples of awesome cereals we didn't get in Canada because Ralston never crossed the border. I remember seeing ads for some of these in comic books and being really pissed that we couldn't get them.
I have incredibly vague memories of having these. Anyone else remember them?
My all-time most-missed cereal from the 80s. This continued on in Canada until the mid-90s, but that was it for them. Sure, they're just a marshmallow-based cereal, but the little corn puffs used as filler were just awesome.
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