A Tribute to Discontinued Cereals
Cap’n Crunch’s Oops! Choco Donuts (2003-2004)
Really now, why mess around with O-shaped cereal, when you can just do it right with little chocolate donuts. Saturday Night Live already established that the secret to all successful athletes are little chocolate donuts. They’re the donuts of champions:
Cap’n Horatio Crunch took notice an unveiled this daring foray into donut replication. And not just cereal O’s, it came complete with sprinkles for a more chocolatey taste. The box even claimed it got its taste from sailing up chocolate rapids and through sprinkle falls. I think the box was a damn liar, however, because it that were true this cereal would still be around.
Cap’n Crunch’s Choco Crunch (1982)
Of course Choco Donuts wasn’t the Captain’s first stab at a chocolate variety of his cereal. Choco Crunch was a more traditional mix of yellow corn squares and chocolate puffs. Much like Crunch Berries, but brown and chocolate flavored. It has its own mascot, Chockle the Blob. ChocoCrunch failed, but was brought back under the same name with a slight variation, chocolate flavored corn squares with no yellow corn pieces. Here’s the original in action:
Vanilly Crunch
If chocolate wasn’t your flavor, the Cap’n had you covered as well. In the 1970s he unveiled a series of flavor variants to meet anyone’s needs. First up is VanillyCrunch, a cereal of vanilla balls straight from Wilma the Winsome White Whale’s mouth (and her bright red “do me” lipstick):
Punch Crunch
Punch Crunch was the fruit-flavored cereal, shaped in “little pink rings with big pink flavor” much like Fruit Loops. Instead of a whale, its mascot was a sailor-clad hippopotamus with teased eye lashes named Harry S. Hippo. Harry is a bit fruity, in more ways than one I believe. The eye contact being made between the Captain and Harry raises more questions than it answers. I could see the Village People getting inspiration for their song “In the Navy” from him:
Cinnamon Crunch
And finally there’s Cinnamon Crunch. In the days before the Soggies there was Jean Lafoote the Barefoot Pirate, who was notorious for his attempts to steal the Captain’s cargo of cereal. Somehow he got his own cereal, as you’ll notice on the box the absence of the name Cap’n Crunch. Even the Cap’n laments the goodness of Jean’s cereal in the ad:
Oops, All Berries!
Yeah, I’m going to throw in one more Cap’n Crunch variant at you. There are plenty more I haven’t mentioned like Volcano Crunch (with pop rocks) and Deep Sea Crunch, but this one is a personal favorite, Oops, All Berries! Even the Onion got in on this cereal. Now before you make the joke, did you know that the Cap’n was once promoted to Admiral? And that promotion led to this cereal? After a tremendous outpouring from his fans, Quaker Oats decided to promote the Cap’n. But Admiral Crunch quickly became bored with his desk job at Crunch Headquarters, and his replacement Cap’ns (Cap’n Scrinch and Cap’n Munch) screwed up the Crunch Berrie and Crunch Biscuit mixing machines, resulting in this cereal. Hence the “Oops!” in the title. The Admiral decided that he was truly the best one suited for the role as the Cap’n and soon regained his old position. And I gained a delicious cereal.
Sir Grapefellow (1972)
Moving on from Cap’n Crunch and the Navy, we turn to two fighter pilots worthy of the Air Force. Who remembers Sir Grapefellow cereal? The first of two World War I pilot breakfast treats, Grapefellow was a debonair British pilot fond of giving us the “okay” sign. He touted a strong smelling grape-flavored (yes, grape) breakfast treat with similarly-tasting marshmallows. Of course it turned the milk a luscious lilac color too. And nothing says cool better than a scarf and aviator goggles! Where have you gone, Sir Grapefellow? Tally-ho!
Baron Von Redberry (1972)
Achtung, baby! No, not U2, but Baron Von Redberry who was Sir Grapefellow’s enemy and countered with his own vaguely fruit-punch-flavored confection loaded with enough sugar to fuel a Panzer corps. Because if there’s one thing that children love, it’s fruit-flavored World War I air aces. You need at least two of them. Besides, the Baron “iz der berry goodest”. People have theorized that World War I theme is influenced by the Peanuts comic strip, which during the 1960s often featured Snoopy in scarf and goggles perched on top of his doghouse in a perpetual battle with the Red Baron. Whether true or not, hapless American children were asked to choose between the two charismatic fellows, but democracy and Sir Grapefellow usually won out.
Crazy Cow (1972-late 1970s)
Because people love the delicious taste of Mad Cow to start their day off. It came in two flavors, chocolate and strawberry, and was a bit of a novelty due to the fact its cereal pellets were coated with an excipient of a drink mix. When milk was added, it would dissolve the powdered coating, and the resultant mixture would resemble in sight, smell, and taste a flavored milk. Not that the concept is all that rare with today’s cereals. Here’s a commercial:
Cocoa Hoots (1972-1975)
This short-lived 1970s sweetened chocolate flavored cereal came complete with safety stickers from Newton the Owl, which you can check out over here. Although the funniest part of the box is the unfortunate location of the Os on the owl’s anatomy. With a name oh so close to Hooters, maybe the design could be a little better. Here’s a sample ad:
Crunchy Loggs (1978-1979)
No, this cereal was not made out of wood. Bixby Beaver pawned off this strawberry flavored “ready-sweetened corn and oat cereal” on kids. One slight problem. The box is a dirty joke waiting to happen. Pink. Beavers. Crunchy Loggs. And one has to ask, what’s more appetizing than chowing down on some Crunchy Loggs? It probably tastes like what you’d get if a cartoon beaver took a dump in your bowl. Cause tht’s what it looks like. So much went wrong on this one.
Mr. Wonderfull’s Suprize (1970s)
Someone must be wearing the Bad Idea Jeans, because here’s another one. Good idea, selling crunchy puffed cereal in vanilla and chocolate flavors. Bad idea, putting frosting in the middle, calling it Mr. Wonderfull’s Suprize, and having kids want to eat some white cream that came out of a creepy man’s balls. At least the chocolate flavored version had brown cream inside, making it slightly less disturbing. Although it just gives you visions of Chef saying, “Suck on my chocolate salty balls.” I’d probably be better off not knowing what Mr. Wonderfull’s Suprize is, but apparently it’s a thin coating of pudding. At least that’s what they tell me it is.
OK
In our Tribute to Fallen Soda, we mentioned OK Soda. So it only seems appropriate that there once was an OK cereal. This one goes way back, and Kellogg’s tried a few methods to sell it. In true paper towel form, above is the “Br-r-awny” look aimed at kids that want to grow up big and strong. Of course, OK can also make you long for the days when cartoon characters acted as pitchmen. Here’s a video with Yogi Bear in place of the buff Scotsman selling OKs:
Quake (1965-1972)
I mentioned at the top that Quisp is still produced, but its original partner in crime, Quake, fell by the way-side. The two were advertised together until 1970 when a no holds barred winner take all contest was held to see which cereal was more popular. Quisp won, and Quake with its no-frills stodgy miner (who later morphed into a cowboy) retreated underground. Dubbed as providing “earthquake power!” to those who ate it, Quake was made at the earth’s core. Here’s what the ad looked like:
Circus Fun
Kaboom may live on, but its distant cousin Circus Fun does not. And its not all that well remembered either. The Circus Fun Clown encouraged the circus theme shaped marshmallows of horses, hoops, balls, bears, elephants, and lions to jump into his “crispy sweetened fruit flavored cereal” (orange tigers were added later). They all combined to form a great center ring adventure, in your mouth. The cereal was like crack rocks for kids, but surprisingly wasn’t too popular. At least the ad was memorable:
