Tag Archives: spooned & spotted

14

Nov. ’18

Spooned & Spotted (Canada): Sugar Cookie Toast Crunch

Sugar Cookie Toast Crunch Canada

There are a lot of things that separate a good cereal from a great cereal: unique flavor, creative theming, brand evolution. But there’s only one thing that separates great cereals and legendary cereals—you know, the kind of breakfast fare you need a Master Bowl to catch.

And that’s accessibility.

Yes, while you’d expect to only encounter legendary cereals on the secluded shores of the Whirl Islands, true morning myths know no borders. They aim for deliciousness for all, and now Sugar Cookie Toast Crunch is joining that wanderlusting pantheon.

Once considered extinct, the Toast Crunch family member I’ve called “the greatest seasonal cereal of all time” has returned this season with full confidence and Canadian citizenship. Spotted by Junk Food Jeff (thanks Jeff!) alongside General Mills’ other, less exciting holiday 2018 release, Canadian Sugar Cookie Toast Crunch boasts exclusive box art, too.

This bluer and more frigid design seems to harken back to the cereal’s original, 2014 art, but now one of the squares wears a pair of floating mittens, frighteningly suggesting rapid mutation and evolution in the Toast Crunch species.

So enjoy Sugar Cookie Toast Crunch while you can, Canadian neighbors, because if this cereal keeps growing new limbs, it might be humankind that’s Limited Edition.

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04

Jul. ’18

Spooned & Spotted: Cap’n Crunch with 3x Bigger Berries!

Cap'n Crunch XL With 3x Bigger Berries and Peanut Butter Pieces

Happy Independence Day, everyone! I hope you’re ready to celebrate independence from your pants size, or at least with this news of XXXL Crunch Berries, independence from unscathed palates.

This truly gasp-inducing (how else will you fit them in your mouth?) news, shared by @theghostinyoumusic on Instagram, didn’t actually take me totally by surprise. Those who remember reading about my leak of Captain Crunch’s Beach Bash will recall that I also under the trademark for Captain Crunch’s Mega Crunch.

I had no idea what it was at the time—truth be told I was hoping it was something a little cooler than giant Peanut Butter Crunch and Crunch Berries—but I guess this is more ergonomically consumed than the giant, meteoric cinder block of solid Crunch Berry I was imagining.

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As you can see from The Ghost in You’s other photo, these jumbo Berries truly are powerful orbs worthy of an RPG fetch quest. And alongside news that Frosted Flakes with Marshmallows is adding 50% more marshmallows, I think this is the most fitting pair of cereal news headlines that could come out of a holiday dedicated to eating enough hot dogs that you ralph just upstream of the family pool.

Happy 4th, y’all! Get an extra Cap’n Slurpee for me.

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16

Feb. ’18

Spooned & Spotted: Lucky Charms Cereal with Magical Unicorn Marshmallows

Though Starbucks’ infamous Unicorn Frappuccino is long dead and gone—presumably with technicolor Snozzberries growing from its fertilized burial grounds—the Jazzy-Solo-Cup-colored liquid’s namesake cryptid is still grabbing the cereal industry by the horn.

Just weeks after Kellogg’s confirmed the in-store release day (March 5th) of its Unicorn Cereal (formerly known as Unicorn Froot Loops when released abroad), and just days after Lucky Charms announced the planned obsolescence of its hourglass marshmallow, Instagram user @sydnee_alexandra stumbled upon this real-life unicorn at an HEB store: a box of unannounced Lucky Charms with Magical Unicorn Marshmallows!

Given that there’s still an hourglass on the box, and that these intricate equine marbits likely have more artifical color than a Dorito at a tanning salon, these Unicorns likely aren’t a permanent replacement.

But I sure hope they taste like cotton candy.

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19

Nov. ’17

Spooned & Spotted: Trader Joe’s Hot Cocoa O’s Cereal

Trader Joe's Hot Cocoa O's Cereal Chocolate Holiday Box

Fight. Fight. Snowball fight!

I know I shouldn’t incite polar breakfast violence, but it just seems a little too convenient that, right after Hot Cocoa Cocoa Puffs broke the ice as the first-ever hot chocolate-flavored cereal, Trader Joe’s hops into the (powdered) mix with a Hot Cocoa O’s Cereal of his own.

So now there’s bound to be a munchy melee between these two well-known cereal champions:

In this corner, we have Sonny and his marshmallow puck-studded Hot Cocoa Cocoa Puffs! Though they may just taste like more sugary Cocoa Puffs, these cozy–crunchy orbs contain great power—and decades of cuckoo cereal clout!

Aaaaand in this corner, we have Trader Joseph and his (hopefully dark) chocolate dark horses! Though Smokin’ Joe the Trader isn’t renowned for his cereal—his Raisin Bran Clusters are perhaps his only belt-bursting championship belt-winner to date—Hot Cocoa O’s look like holiday Oreo O’s, and that alone is enough to sell more tickets than a Bob Dylan–Katy Perry tag team at Summer Slam!

Yes, I look forward to reviewing this hot chocolate cereal as soon as I find it—hopefully right next to the almond ‘nog so I can drown my early-sunset-imposed sorrows right along with my marshmallowy chocolate hoops.

Thanks to @OUATreviewed on Twitter for coming through with the find. If you have a merry cereal snapshot of your own to share, ship it via email or Polar Express on our Submissions page!

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11

Nov. ’17

Spooned & Spotted: Kellogg’s Donut Shop Cereal (Chocolate & Pink)

Kellogg's Donut Shop Cereal Boxes Chocolate and Pink

Okay fine, Kellogg’s, I’ll forgive you for egregiously misspelling “Doughnut” as “Donut.” Sure, it’s grammatically correct, but removing the “UGH” removes the rounded pastry’s inherent charm, making me vocally say…you guessed it: “Grrr! Arghh! Zounds!”

Even a pedant like me can’t stay mad when there are two new doughnutty cereals hitting the market. We’ve known that this Chocolate Donut Cereal was coming for a while now, but the surprise debut of Pink Donut Cereal, seen in this photo from a Marc’s store that was sent in by reader GM, has left me tickled pink.

So what does “pink” taste like? Well if it’s anything like “blue,” then I’m ready for it. It could mean strawberry, plain frosting, Chicken McNugget Pink Slime, or even Canadian Birthday Cake (a reader noticed the visual similarity between Pink Donut Cereal and a certain Froot Loops flavor). Whatever it is, I’ll still happily crunch away, because cereal renditions of my favorite breakfast baked good are hard to crumb by these days.

Thanks again to GM for the photo. If you have a cool cereal photo of your own to share, or if you just want to fax me a fresh doughnut, roll over to our Submissions page.

 

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01

Oct. ’17

Spooned & Spotted: Barbara’s Puffins – Berry Burst Protein

This is a Puffins appreciation post.

For years, Puffins have quietly been one of the uniquely crunchiest and wholesome cereal lines in the cereal aisle (or sometimes the health food aisle—you know, the aisle that feels like Woodstock and a farmer’s market had a straight-edged child?). And for years, no one has been talking about them! Sure, the brand’s Stoically Unnamed Puffin Mascot may not have the appeal of Tony the Tiger or Cap’n Crunch, but any bird that can perch on a spoon without spilling its contents deserves praise—or at least a Licensed Yoga Instructor certificate.

Oh, and the cereal is pretty darn good, too. From Cinnamon to Peanut Butter & Chocolate, Puffins keeps it simple, rarely introducing new flavors. But now we’re getting the first new Puffins variety since 2015’s Limited Edition Pumpkin Puffins. Puffins PROTEIN BERRY BURST (their all-caps, not mine) is gluten free and apparently hitting Whole Foods already, thanks to this photo from friend-of-Cerealously Cereal Party. This is interesting, as I messaged Barbara’s Bakery about the product, and they said it won’t be coming out until 2018.

Either this one Whole Foods has a magical time portal to the future, or Barbara is lying to me as part of a grand conspiracy to deprive me of protein and steal my tender tendons.

Since I might not find this cereal for a while, I can only speculate as to what it’ll taste like. It appears to mix regular Puffins with a mixed berry puree (probably strawberry, raspberry, and perhaps blueberry), and the gluten-free label suggests it will be heavy on the corniness. Since the holidays are already approaching, I’m just gonna pretend it tastes like that one fruitcake that’s been stuck in an infinite loop of re-gifting within my family for the past 5 years.

Hey, speaking of holidays: when are we getting Gingerbread Puffins. I mean, the cereal already has molasses in it, and you could PhotoShop gumdrop buttons onto that Puffin mascot faster than I could re-gift a fruitcake!

Thanks again to Cereal Party for sharing the photo. If you have any great product photos of your own—whether they’re new, old, full of protein or full of gluten—we want to see ’em! Send them on over to our Submissions page, and they could appear on the site.

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05

Sep. ’17

Spooned & Spotted: New Looks for Old Cereals

New Rice Krispies Cereal Snap, Crackle, and Pop Designs

Aside from hunting new cereals, Pop-Tarts and Hostess snack cakes (my secret passion—Chocodiles used to be my fudge-slathered white whales), one of my oldest grocery store past times is looking for box art variations of breakfast mainstays.

Sometimes the differences are nuanced and small, like earlier this year when French Toast Crunch’s plain red box adopted a drop shadow, but sometimes classic cereal boxes we’ve come to love dramatically evolve overnight, like metamorphosed sugar-encrusted butterflies emerging from their cardboard chrysalises. As we’ll soon see, French Toast Crunch just did that, too—and so did another long-beloved morning mainstay.

But before we judge those, let’s appraise Snap, Crackle, and Pop’s recent Rice Krispies plastic surgery, which I noticed while trying (and failing) to find those elusive new Pumpkin Spice Rice Krispies Treats.  Continue reading →

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30

Aug. ’17

Spooned & Spotted: Pumpkin Pie Rice Krispies Treats

Kellogg's Limited Edition Pumpkin Pie Rice Krispies Treats Box

Let’s just get this out of the way, since you knew I was going to say it anyway:

TRICK OR RICE KRISPIES TREAT!

There, now that we have the formalities out of the way, we can talk about Kellogg’s awesome new Pumpkin Pie Rice Krispies Treats, which have, apparently, quietly snuck onto Walmart shelves without saying boo. Seriously, this is a small miracle: so many products leak online before we actually see them physically, so Pumpkin Pie Rice Krispies Treats must’ve embraced the spirit of Halloween and costumed themselves on the way to the warehouse.

I bet they were hiding in a box of ironing board covers.

No word yet on whether these fun-sized (*In my Jerry Seinfeld voice:* What’s fun about less food?), limited edition Rice Krispies Treats actually have pumpkin and spice-flavored Krispies, or if it’s just a flavored icing bearing the brunt of the flavor, but I’m excited to get my hungry fingers—7 of which are already wearing thos cheap plastic dollar store bat rings—on a box to try ’em.

The best part is that Pumpkin Pie Rice Krispies Treats come forty to a box. So while they’re clearly meant to be given out to trick-or-treaters, I could totally inhale all of them and turn XL from a Roman numeral into my sweatpants size.

‘Tis the season of elastic waistbands!

Massive thanks to Marcus and Matthew S. for sharing this photo. If you have a cool cereal photo of your own to share, whether it’s seasonal or just really freakin’ sweet, send it in over to our Submissions page—you might just see it on the site!

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