0:38

Hello, friends, welcome to

0:42

our 100th episode,

0:45

Birthday Blowout. It's a pretty subdued

0:47

party. It is after all still

0:50

the empty bowl, a meditative podcast about

0:52

cereal. My name is

0:55

Justin McElroy. I'm a cereal enthusiast who has

0:57

co-hosted 99 of the 100 episodes of the

0:59

empty bowl. Oh,

1:02

man, I forgot about this one. This isn't even

1:04

your 100th episode. This is really my party. This

1:06

is not. This is my 99th episode. Well,

1:10

my name's Dan Gubaire and I am

1:12

a cereal centurion, a commanding legion of

1:14

100 empty bowl episodes.

1:17

Every single one co-hosted by me. This

1:21

is maybe our most jam-packed episode.

1:23

It's probably going to be our

1:26

longest. We've got a

1:28

lot for you. And you

1:30

know, if you like to go to sleep with

1:32

the empty bowl, I figure this is a good

1:34

one, right? Because it's going to be

1:36

extra long. You need a little extra time getting to

1:38

sleep. And we've got you. But

1:41

this episode questions.

1:43

We got tons of them. News. We've

1:46

got reviews of some of the biggest cereals

1:48

of the year and it's only January. Yeah,

1:50

it's here. It's the empty

1:52

bowl and we're so excited to get started. Dan,

1:54

I do want to talk about some of those

1:56

new cereals that we've both tried, but

1:59

first. Let's look in the future a little bit.

2:01

What's what's coming up in the world of cereal news?

2:05

Yeah, so we got some odds and ends

2:07

coming to the cereal world starting with Cinnamon

2:10

toast crunch iced coffee that's

2:12

landing in Sam's Club in

2:14

February. Hmm I

2:17

mean, I don't have a Sam's Club membership, but I

2:19

think they make it pretty easy to order these things

2:21

online now so if you are interested in getting a

2:23

12 pack brick

2:25

of cinnamon toast crunch iced coffees,

2:27

which I Feel like

2:30

you really got to make a commitment to something like

2:32

this It

2:34

seems like more of like a one-and-done sort

2:36

of convenience store purchase in my opinion It

2:40

just seems like I don't know. Did they do like

2:42

free samples at Sam's Club like they do at Costco?

2:44

Is this something you can yeah? Yeah, I was definitely

2:47

At Sam's Club for the first time in my entire

2:50

life last weekend and they did have free samples They

2:53

didn't have this one yet, though. No, no,

2:55

but I saw Well, I

2:58

can probably imagine what this would taste like. I imagine

3:01

it's pretty good and You

3:04

know just putting it on your radar not

3:06

the most exciting one to lead off our

3:08

hey, hey episode, but somebody's gonna

3:12

Kick us off. I guess yeah Well,

3:16

welcome to the world baby

3:18

cinnamon Raise

3:21

you right the

3:23

next next is a Another

3:26

co-branded co-sponsored New

3:29

cereal. Yeah, so this

3:31

is a crumble cookies Chocolatey chip

3:34

cookie cereal that is coming

3:36

out with this collab between crumble cookies

3:38

and Kellogg's Yeah, which

3:40

is interesting because you know general Mills

3:42

obviously has cookie crisp Post

3:45

has their chips ahoy cereal, so

3:47

this is Kellogg's really first foray

3:50

into the Chocolate

3:52

chip cookie cereal genre which

3:54

it will be very interesting to see how

3:57

they approach it at least

3:59

for my money I think Post-ship sahoyed cereal is

4:01

miles better than cookie crisp at this

4:03

point just because they use Like

4:06

better base flour ingredients than

4:08

the extremely corny cookie crisp,

4:11

right? Oh, I'm curious to see where this

4:13

will fall Yeah,

4:16

I'll be interested to try it for sure

4:22

But you know, I can't imagine this

4:24

cereal it's a real phenomenon

4:26

That's what I'm yeah, I

4:28

kind of feel like if you can make cookie studies

4:31

and probably make better cookies at

4:33

home But you know, that's that's a

4:35

privilege that I have Others

4:37

may not have the time or inclination to make

4:40

their own dang cookies and I get it. I

4:42

get it Yeah I've been to

4:44

chrome cookies only a few times specifically to

4:46

try their different cereal collabs like the Reese's

4:48

puffs cookie or the pop-tarts cookie or whatever

4:51

and every time I'm just overwhelmed

4:53

by The atmosphere in there

4:55

and just how many people are so excited to

4:57

be there Which you know, it takes

4:59

a lot to overwhelm me considering how often I need

5:01

to go to the Walmart cereal aisle How

5:05

you know the atmosphere there is Intense.

5:08

Yeah, I will say from looking at

5:10

this crumble cookie cereal box I'm

5:13

really hoping this is only an initial render

5:15

because man these look pretty skimpy on the

5:17

chocolate chips. Yeah, very faint

5:20

It looks like yeah, it looks like there's some dust

5:22

on the box and he swept off Yeah,

5:27

we'll keep you posted on this one for here well,

5:29

we'll keep you Kellogg's all right, right

5:36

Now okay see this this next story popped

5:38

up and I had I was so

5:40

frustrated because I couldn't figure out how to Take

5:43

advantage of this this offer an incredible

5:45

offer. Yeah, this is one of those

5:47

unfortunate cases Where given the staggered release

5:50

schedule of our episodes isn't really beneficial

5:52

news to anyone but

5:55

we mentioned a while back that Taco Bell

5:57

was gonna drop a cinnamon twist cereal and

6:00

They did it this past week if you

6:02

can consider the most convoluted

6:05

release method ever to be

6:07

quote-unquote dropped Yeah

6:10

So there were three ways to get one

6:12

of these boxes You could be an uber

6:14

one member and order a box

6:16

for free You could be

6:19

an uber eats user in New

6:21

York City Chicago Atlanta Los Angeles

6:23

Miami and Dallas to get

6:25

a box with free delivery on a Taco

6:27

Bell breakfast order placed before 11 a.m. while

6:30

supplies last Right or you

6:32

could have been the first of 500 Taco

6:35

Bell rewards members to get a box

6:37

for free as part of Taco Bell's

6:39

Tuesday drop series So sorry

6:41

for not telling you about this earlier, but I can't

6:43

imagine It's very easy

6:46

to to land a box. Yeah, you would

6:48

have just been frustrated friends like trust me.

6:50

You don't need it I'm told my friend

6:52

Kristen who is very into Taco Bell Lore

6:55

and acquiring all the new stuff is gonna try and

6:57

hook me up with a box So this story might

7:00

not be over just yet But

7:02

from the looks of this cereal it

7:04

honestly looks pretty genuine I was thinking that they

7:06

were just gonna like team up

7:08

with General Mills and use a bunch of

7:11

the leftover cinnamon toast crunch Churro

7:13

pieces and just re-release them under the

7:15

Taco Bell branding You

7:18

look at this and they just crumble up some

7:20

actual cinnamon crisps In a

7:22

box and I look exactly like what

7:24

it is like very yeah sized little

7:26

cinnamon twists Which if it

7:28

is the exact same product that they

7:30

sell in Taco Bell restaurants Then I

7:32

can imagine that these would

7:34

absolutely vaporize at the slightest touch

7:37

of milk. Yeah So

7:39

it'll be interesting to try that yeah It's interesting

7:41

to see like I wonder if they had to

7:43

come up this seems like a hard cereal to

7:46

make right like when Carville did their cereal like

7:48

it was just a bunch of

7:50

crunchies thrown in a box and it was

7:52

incredible But yeah, I'm sure it was fantastic

7:54

right, but you know It

7:57

seems like a lot of work would have had to go into this.

7:59

I don't know I can't even comprehend

8:01

how they make the cinnamon twist something so

8:03

light and ethereal and fragile like that So

8:07

there must be some sort of complex

8:09

sorcery taking place there. Yeah That

8:13

is the future though Dan and we have just

8:15

been Absolutely spoiled

8:18

this month with January's always a big

8:20

month for cereal for whatever reason and

8:23

this this January was no No

8:26

exception. Where are we gonna start with some of these

8:28

new cereals? So I think

8:30

we should start with the General Mills

8:32

loaded cereals There's three

8:34

of these and I got all of them. I don't know if

8:36

you managed to get any of these. I But

8:39

two of them I didn't get a cookbook,

8:41

but I got the other two, okay So

8:44

this was basically General Mills attempt

8:46

at latest attempt rather

8:49

at releasing filled cereals. This

8:51

has been quite

8:54

the learning process for General Mills over

8:56

the years as they have had a

8:58

couple flops and follies with their approaches

9:01

to filled cereals first

9:03

we had the Philos cereals

9:05

which People people

9:07

tended to find a little bit too dense

9:10

a little bit too decadent wasn't necessarily a

9:13

problem for me I love my cereals to

9:15

be weighty. That's why I love the Carvel

9:17

crunchy so much. They sank to the bottom

9:19

of the bowl like gravel And

9:22

so did the fillers as well So I

9:24

mean I suppose if you are someone like

9:27

me who almost exclusively eats cereal as a

9:29

dessert or as a treat Then

9:32

the decadent appeal becomes more strong,

9:34

but I could see how something

9:37

like the fillers didn't necessarily translate to

9:39

an Energizing breakfast rather than

9:41

something that would just anchor you back to

9:44

your bed And

9:46

then they sort of General Mills Experimented

9:48

again with these filled

9:51

bites cereals that only reached Extremely

9:54

limited target or test markets

9:56

rather in Minnesota that I

9:58

had to have someone send me boxes of

10:00

and those came in Golden Graham s'mores

10:02

and Pillsbury

10:04

cinnamon roll varieties and Those

10:08

are essentially the exact same as fillers. They

10:11

did not solve the density issue Quote-unquote

10:14

issue with those so I can see why

10:16

those didn't make it to market even though

10:19

I'm still thinking about those Golden Graham

10:21

s'mores ones to this day because those

10:23

are absolutely phenomenal Yeah, but it does

10:26

seem like General Mills really learned their

10:28

lesson quote-unquote again Learn their lesson because

10:31

these are way less dense these loaded

10:33

cereals are It seems

10:35

like they were taking more of a crave approach

10:37

to making it a filled cereal that is still

10:40

Can still go toe-to-toe with your

10:42

more light and airy puffed cereals

10:45

right and there is a lot of

10:48

aeration to these loaded cereals too and while

10:52

Given what I just said you can imagine why

10:54

this isn't Super thrilling

10:56

to me someone who is expecting that

10:58

same density and Intensity

11:01

I guess these

11:03

do probably have more mainstream appeal in

11:05

that sense What

11:08

were your initial impressions before I go

11:10

on a flavor-by-flavor basis? I

11:13

don't I don't love the I don't

11:15

typically love filled cereals. I do prefer Things

11:18

to be a little lighter. I prefer the

11:20

the lightness of that I

11:23

will say I really did like these

11:25

though. I thought that The

11:28

the best comparison I can come up with is and

11:30

I don't know if this will make

11:33

sense to everybody but the If

11:35

you ever get like the wafer cookies Like

11:38

the ones that have like a fruit fruit filling

11:41

in them especially

11:43

like the tricks and that

11:46

that really that is really what it reminded

11:48

me of that like a

11:51

Way free like slightly of cream, but really

11:53

like fall apart in your mouth kind of

11:55

texture I think

11:57

I like these more than the fillows. I

11:59

will say that well I'll let you get

12:02

into the flavor by flavor once but

12:04

yeah I like them more than the fillers

12:06

I dug these really

12:08

I thought also great for like

12:10

snacking more than like

12:12

an actual ball full for for me but

12:15

yeah I would agree I mean despite not

12:17

feeling extremely thrilled by them I can't

12:19

stop myself from from chowing down by

12:21

the dry handful definitely a good horse

12:23

cereal as I like to call them

12:26

strap on the feed bag and go

12:28

but flavor by flavor I think the

12:30

cinnamon toast crunch one was

12:32

really strong I'm not

12:35

really flavor was strong or good just

12:38

like powerful or strong as an outright

12:40

well-rounded contender probably the most balanced of

12:42

all of these it's just this is

12:44

the one that since there were Pillsbury

12:47

cinnamon roll fillows and cinnamon roll

12:49

filled bites I couldn't help but

12:51

make that comparison to what I've

12:53

already tasted before and want

12:55

a little bit more of that

12:58

robustness I think it's interesting

13:00

that they chose to give like a vanilla cream

13:02

filling to all three of them instead of sort

13:04

of yeah up a little bit I'm

13:07

just kind of a real crave maniac

13:09

so I was also comparing it to

13:12

that chocolatey filling and it just seems like

13:14

the vanilla cream filling doesn't have

13:16

them doesn't have quite the same distinct

13:18

punch so you are focusing

13:20

more on the shell rather than

13:23

the actual loaded filling itself and

13:25

it did seem to me that in the case

13:28

of all three of these loaded cereals that compared

13:31

to the namesake cereals that they're based

13:33

off of none of them had quite

13:35

the same potency of flavor did

13:38

you feel yeah it did seem especially tricks

13:40

I noticed seemed a bit more muted than

13:42

you would normally get from tricks I

13:45

do think ultimately the tricks was still

13:47

my favorite just because I think like

13:49

the berries and cream interplay makes

13:51

the most sense out of all of these combos

13:54

so could be the texture difference too

13:56

that is creating the the the flavor

13:58

difference right if it's more aerated then there's

14:00

going to be less like tricks matter.

14:03

Mm-hmm. Yeah, I did find that

14:05

the texture was a little bit troubling at time

14:07

just because it seems to emphasize the dryness of

14:09

them and also like... Yeah. It

14:12

almost has the same textural risk

14:15

factor that Cap'n Crunch has where it was kind

14:18

of shredding the top of the roof of my

14:20

mouth. And when you couple that with

14:22

the fact that they're kind of square and have

14:24

corners to them too, they're kind of

14:27

like a little risky to eat too fast

14:29

lest you wish to poke and

14:31

scrape the roof of your mouth too much. I

14:34

guess rounding it out then, the Cocoa Puffs I

14:37

think was the one that did the least for

14:39

me just because again making

14:41

that mental comparison to Crave is

14:43

difficult where Crave is

14:45

very chocolate forward in

14:48

that the filling is chocolate flavored so that

14:50

the shell becomes sort of an afterthought but

14:52

putting the chocolate in the

14:54

shell as opposed to the filling just kind of

14:57

makes it feel like it's taking a back seat

14:59

to this more straightforward sweetness of the

15:01

filling. Yeah, it doesn't seem like

15:03

they could have gotten a bit more fudgier

15:05

with that. I'm surprised to hear that it's

15:07

a vanilla cream that seems weird. Yeah, they

15:09

could have done like vanilla cream for the

15:11

Cinnamon Toast Crunch, like a pink fruity cream

15:13

for the tricks and like a chocolate one

15:15

for the Cocoa Puffs and it would have

15:17

elevated a little bit. I get it,

15:20

it's a little costly. What

15:25

about, if you're

15:27

ready to move on past these filled cereals,

15:30

I've fully unloaded. I would

15:32

say if you want to try these

15:34

though, I would not wait because I

15:36

would be surprised if these are a

15:38

new long term sort of offering. That

15:41

would surprise me. It feels a little promotional.

15:44

It feels a little meaty for me. You'll

15:46

see. Something interesting I noted was

15:48

it's going to be a broader trend is that, does

15:50

it feel to you like the boxes or the

15:53

backs of cereal boxes is kind of like

15:55

a dying genre? Absolutely. If

15:57

they're not doing anything with that space

15:59

anymore? Absolutely. I look

16:01

at the back of these loaded cereals and

16:03

it's just a giant graphic of the cereal

16:05

being served out of a crown with

16:08

the phrase live in cereal rich So

16:11

let's show us what does that do for me? What

16:13

does that do? What am I? Well,

16:15

it says show us how you live

16:17

cereal rich at live in loaded cereal

16:19

calm I don't think I'll do that

16:21

and like you go to live in loaded Cereal

16:23

you go there. I don't know a person to

16:26

go there you go there First of all,

16:28

you have to confirm your age to enter in

16:30

the first place That

16:32

adult material. Yeah And

16:35

I go in and it's just it's telling me

16:37

about the cereal that I already purchased and

16:40

it says get ready in 12 days One

16:43

hour 9 minutes 6 5

16:46

4 seconds. So it's a countdown but the cereal

16:48

is already out there So I

16:51

don't know if this is some weird promotion. Maybe that's

16:53

what that's when they'll take it off shelf That

16:57

seems about right. This is when

16:59

the cereals will have the loaded cereals will hatch in

17:01

12 days Yeah,

17:04

this one there they're manchurian

17:06

candidate style activation words will

17:09

activate the splinter cells But

17:11

yeah, it's the case with all these other general milk

17:13

cereals I got to where just there's nothing on the

17:15

back of the box anymore And I

17:18

get it with the advent of phones

17:20

everywhere People don't really need breakfast table

17:22

entertainment like they used to but

17:24

sure that's a good point man

17:27

If any you cereal companies need a dedicated

17:29

back-of-box Creative director, I'm right

17:31

here for you There

17:34

we go, that would be yes, please dance

17:36

right here y'all Okay

17:41

golden Graham Smores where you at I

17:47

Honestly concerned that I got a bad

17:49

box because you texted me that it's

17:51

really really good But something really really

17:53

like death mine. I'll just explain my

17:56

experience first where

17:58

it It seems like

18:00

something's wrong with the chocolate gram pieces in

18:02

mind, just because that was the piece I

18:04

was really excited about, so I just got

18:06

a handful of just those to try them.

18:09

And there's almost like this fake

18:11

synthetic plasticiness to them that really

18:13

puts a damper on the cereal as a whole.

18:16

And I posted about this on Twitter, and it

18:18

did seem like the consensus was

18:20

that maybe something was wrong with the box that

18:22

I got, which is really disappointing because

18:24

I was looking forward to this one. And it's a beautiful

18:26

box also, so maybe you

18:28

can give a more recent take

18:30

on this. You know, Griffin

18:32

told me the same thing, though. It's

18:34

very, that's very strange. Like he

18:37

did not enjoy it. Griffin Travis, one of them, I

18:39

bullied into it. Yeah,

18:41

I don't know. The chocolate gram pieces I

18:44

thought were great. I thought it was a

18:46

really good blend. I thought

18:48

the flavor of the gram

18:50

pieces with the

18:52

chocolate on them was like really nice. Good

18:57

density of marshmallows, good mix of

18:59

pieces. It's so strange. I don't

19:01

know. This is

19:03

very rare normally. The

19:06

fact that it had a weird aftertaste, I got none of

19:08

that. So I don't know. Maybe it was a bad box.

19:10

I don't know. I mean, it's very

19:12

strange. Did he, did Griffin try from your same

19:14

box, or did he have his own? No, no,

19:17

no. He got his own box somewhere else, which

19:19

is why I'm thinking that. Like interesting. I

19:23

wasn't sure if it was some like genetic

19:25

disparity or something like cilantro. The

19:27

only other case I can think of where something like

19:30

this happened was back with like the nutter butter cereal.

19:32

A cereal that I absolutely loved and enjoyed, but

19:35

I got so many comments from people who were

19:37

like, it tastes like some horrific

19:39

mold to me. Like

19:42

I don't know how that's possible,

19:44

but I guess tastes can

19:46

vary strongly. Maybe I'll try

19:48

another box if I can get one. He'll

19:50

drive to the other side of town. Yeah.

19:54

The good Walmart where the non-poisoned

19:56

cereals are. Did you feel like

19:58

the chocolate graham? pieces like actually

20:01

tasted like chocolate and golden grams or

20:03

were they kind of like their

20:05

own purely chocolate piece? No,

20:08

I got the gram flavor from the

20:10

inside and the outside, I would not

20:12

say the chocolate was particularly overwhelming, it

20:15

really blends into it. It tastes more

20:17

like a cinnamony chocolate like the cinnamon

20:19

is more, it's

20:22

more cinnamon forward from

20:24

in my experience. Hmm,

20:26

okay. Isn't that interesting?

20:29

I really dug it so I don't know. I don't

20:33

know. I haven't read

20:35

it just yet but yeah.

20:38

Maple cinnamon Cheerios hearty nut

20:40

medley. I also

20:42

grabbed a box of this Dan because I love myself

20:44

and I care about myself. And I

20:46

love a good medley. What did you think of maple

20:49

cinnamon Cheerios hearty nut medley? I feel like

20:52

they're just for making it intentionally difficult to

20:54

remember now. Man, what did

20:56

I think of maple cinnamon Cheerios hearty nut

20:58

medley? When I think about maple cinnamon Cheerios

21:00

hearty nut medley, I focus a lot on

21:03

the maple and the cinnamon as well as

21:05

the Cheerios and the hearty nut medley. How

21:08

can you separate them? I mean, you can't use

21:12

any fewer words to describe

21:14

this cereal. Okay, so I

21:16

feel like, wait, one quick note, I feel

21:19

like Cheerios at this point would

21:21

benefit from what Coke has

21:23

been doing where if Coke

21:25

has a new variety anymore, they don't

21:27

try to pretend it tastes like anything.

21:30

They'll call it like Coca-Cola dream or

21:33

Coca-Cola sunshine. You know what I mean? I think

21:35

Cheerios is at that point, right? It should be

21:37

like Cheerios harvest.

21:40

Cheerios, I

21:43

see I'm not an expert. I'm not the

21:45

green. I'm not a genius about this stuff,

21:47

but it's getting harder to track the Cheerios.

21:49

Yeah, you could just call this Cheerios

21:51

heart, heartful Cheerios. This

21:54

is a unique one though. I mean, it's a

21:56

different kind of thing because you got flakes and

21:58

Cheerios in the same cereal. And I got to know

22:00

where you're at with it. Yeah, so this

22:03

has been done before with the Cheerios

22:05

medley crunch honey nut Cheerios medley crunch

22:08

where they had Cheerios flakes and Granola

22:11

clusters and I think The

22:14

textural contrast is pretty great. I

22:17

like having Cheerios and flakes I

22:19

like a good as I said before a playground for

22:21

my palette. I like to have a lot of things

22:24

going on I Do

22:27

feel that the cinnamon plays the strongest role

22:30

here in terms of the flavor didn't necessarily

22:32

get a ton of maple And

22:35

it does seem like the flakes weren't

22:37

especially potent in their own

22:39

right but taken as a whole

22:41

I think it was I Think

22:45

the most true word on the box is

22:47

hardy because I definitely got a lot of

22:49

hardiness out of this It's

22:51

very earthen Like it's hard

22:53

to distinguish each individual part of this and

22:56

like pull it out from that So

22:58

I think just taking it as a whole it was kind of

23:00

like eating Almost like

23:02

a nice trail mix. I could definitely see

23:04

myself eating this camping or while hiking I

23:09

don't know if it necessarily did much to elevate

23:11

it Amongst other similar

23:13

like mixed cereals like you would like

23:15

a honey bunches of oats or something

23:17

like that Yeah,

23:20

I really this was quite good. I will

23:23

say though to that hardiness and your

23:26

mileage may vary but I There

23:30

was something about the flake texture and the

23:32

way it started to sog faster than some

23:34

of the other pieces That

23:37

I've it kind of messed up

23:39

that like crunch factor for

23:41

me. Like I kind of found myself wishing I

23:43

was eating some Of

23:46

the like oats and what are those

23:48

called the good the chills of crunch the

23:50

good chills crunch? Yeah Yeah, the good cheer.

23:52

Yes. I kind of found myself

23:55

wishing I was eating that cuz I felt like the flakes were just

23:57

sort of Slowing the whole

23:59

thing down I thought that was a less great

24:01

inclusion. They

24:05

do kind of act like a binding agent

24:07

once you get them all sogged up. And

24:10

I do feel like my biggest note was that this

24:12

could have used granola clusters.

24:14

Like that would have went a really long way.

24:18

Not really sure why they didn't, but it did need that crunch. Yeah,

24:22

for sure. The seams are nice

24:24

though. The

24:28

seams are nice though. More whole seeds.

24:30

More whole stuff like that. I like

24:32

that in a mix. Your

24:36

point earlier did make me think that in

24:38

terms of naming cereals esoterically, that's kind of

24:40

like the appeal of that HEB, morning sunshine

24:42

cereal. Yeah, for sure. That's a good point.

24:47

You go into that cereal not knowing what that even

24:49

means, and it turned out to be the greatest cereal

24:51

ever. I really want to get another

24:53

box of that. I wish I

24:55

was near an HEB right now for sure. Let's

25:02

see, Vanilla Latte Special K. Now I did

25:05

not try this one, so you'll have to

25:07

fill me in. Yeah, this

25:09

one snuck onto shelves with very little fanfare.

25:11

I didn't even honestly know that it was

25:13

a thing until I saw it at Walmart.

25:15

So I had to give it a try

25:17

being a fan of coffee flavors such as

25:19

this. Honestly,

25:22

they nail the flavor super hard with

25:25

the flakes. This

25:27

tastes like a vanilla latte outright.

25:29

It's got that warm

25:32

brown sugary coffee-ness to it, which

25:34

is really, really good. It's

25:36

subtle, but actually it's

25:39

not subtle. I don't know why I said that.

25:41

It's actually very strong. It's

25:43

subtly strong. Those

25:46

other caffeinated coffee cereals in the

25:48

past, like

25:50

the Mocha Crunch and the

25:53

Caramel Macchiato cereal, those all just

25:55

fade in my memory so easily.

25:58

But these flakes are definitely a lot of fun. like probably

26:01

the most authentically coffee-flavored cereal

26:03

that I've had ever

26:05

since I tried that like independent coffee

26:07

cereal that literally just tasted like crunchy

26:10

black coffee. There's

26:12

a much more palatable sweetness

26:14

to this iced vanilla latte

26:16

Special K and I

26:18

would honestly call it like a really

26:21

really high tier early contender for cereal

26:23

of the year if they

26:25

didn't have a critical flaw with

26:27

how few clusters are in this

26:29

cereal. You hate

26:31

to hear it. Honestly single digit clusters in

26:34

the entire bag and I scoped the whole

26:36

thing out which is a really

26:38

big shame because the clusters are so good from

26:40

the very few of them that I tried. They

26:43

added another really nice crunch and

26:45

they got this really nice burst

26:48

of creamy vanilla sweetness that complements

26:50

the coffee overtones extremely well. So

26:53

again not sure if it's a matter of

26:55

me having a bad box. I did look

26:58

this cereal up and it seems that cluster

27:01

scarcity is a common recurring issue

27:03

so I don't I

27:06

don't know I hesitate to recommend it outright unless you

27:08

have like your own vanilla granola that you could add

27:10

to it that'd probably be a good move. Of

27:16

course we all have our own vanilla granola on

27:19

hand ready to add in a fanny pack. I

27:23

had I tried

27:25

most of these a few

27:28

that I just wanted to add to put on

27:30

Foltz radar. I

27:32

had Seabury Crunch. I

27:38

got Seabury Crunch and the peanut

27:41

butter. No

27:43

this is separate Seabury Crunch. What was the other

27:45

was there another um I feel

27:47

like there's another Captain

27:49

Crunch. Yes yes that's what

27:51

it was. I got Cinnamon Crunch and Seabury

27:54

Crunch and I

27:56

got an email three

27:58

days after it was like hey. Just

28:00

a quick heads up to a

28:02

man. There may be some salmonella in

28:05

those like Well

28:07

in for a penny in for a pound.

28:09

I had eaten them both before I not

28:11

completely I'd eaten the both before I sort

28:13

of got the lay of the land there, but I

28:15

disposed of the rest I See

28:19

berry crunch is just it's just the blue ones.

28:22

I honestly I I it's just it Which

28:24

is what we kind of thought but I

28:26

had to be sure so bear That

28:30

one was just crunchy berries. Don't waste your time

28:34

cinnamon crunch I really liked

28:36

it. It's like it reminded me of crunchy

28:38

stars, which was a Swedish

28:40

chef themed cereal for when I was

28:42

a youngster I

28:45

really liked it a lot if you like

28:47

cinnamon and and cap and crunch. It's good

28:51

I ate a I tried a new

28:53

like soy protein Style like

28:55

low carbs here called eat your mouth

28:58

off It

29:00

was there. Um, I It's

29:03

you always have to kind of grade these on a scale but

29:05

I think of the this sort of

29:08

cereal it's a very good version of

29:10

that like the Crunch

29:12

the texture is very good There's not like that a kind

29:14

of a gross medicinal aftertaste like you get in a lot

29:16

of these If you're if

29:18

you're if it's a kind of eating you like to

29:21

do it's definitely worth trying I

29:24

want like a Kellogg's or General Mills brand.

29:26

I think it is one of theirs It

29:30

was it popped up. I just kind of saw it on the

29:33

The the wall all my Walmart puts on

29:35

the new stuff in like one Section

29:39

and I just sort of pop so I'll pop up

29:41

there It is Kellogg's.

29:43

Yeah. Yeah, I saw some of the

29:45

branding for this It just really seems

29:47

like the most like fellow kids cereal

29:50

coming out Like

29:52

it's really trying to piggyback off of like the

29:54

magic spoon magic

29:56

spoonification of the cereal aisle

29:59

and like some of the copywriting on

30:02

it is just not great. It

30:05

says on the back, I don't mind cereal in bed,

30:07

but I prefer it in a bowl. What

30:10

does that even mean? What does that mean, y'all?

30:12

What does it mean? That

30:15

one, you know, if you like that kind of cereal,

30:17

it's good. I

30:20

think that's something that I tried. You

30:25

didn't. I hope that

30:27

they actually re-released the

30:30

new Cap'n Crunch cereals after the

30:32

Salmonella scare, and that they don't

30:34

become like lost cereal media, essentially.

30:36

Yeah. Because Quaker did have to

30:38

recall a lot of their products

30:40

for the Salmonella scare. And

30:42

like I even, when I went to Walmart,

30:45

I saw the Cinnamon Crunch there, and I wanted

30:48

to try it. I knew full

30:50

well about the Salmonella scare,

30:52

and still decided to put it into my

30:54

grocery cart, willing to make that sacrifice for

30:56

all of you. But then

30:59

I did try to scan it at checkout, and

31:01

the guy like swiped it out of my hands,

31:03

and told me he could not sell it to

31:05

me. So unless I want to go

31:07

buy like limited Salmonella edition Cap'n Crunch

31:09

off eBay, I don't think I'll

31:11

be able to contribute my opinion. Dan,

31:14

I was trying to remember, is Berry

31:16

Pebbles new? Berry

31:19

Pebbles was among the new cereals that was

31:21

there. And I, for the life of me,

31:24

Charlie, my nine-year-old, And

31:27

it definitely like, they released so many varieties of

31:29

this, like it wouldn't surprise me. But I was

31:31

trying to remember. Yeah, it's not new,

31:33

but it is a new, newly

31:35

permanent addition to the Pebbles lineup. I

31:38

got like a new one. Okay, so

31:40

it's like a re-release to its like

31:42

full. Yeah, full. It's that

31:44

elevated. It's the pantheon of permanent

31:46

Pebbles. It's pretty

31:49

good. Still pretty good. I

31:51

tried that Reese's Peanut Butter Lovers, by

31:53

the way. If you like peanut butter

31:55

cereals, I like it better than Cap'n

31:58

Crunch, but that is. Now

32:00

have you tried peanut butter puffins and

32:02

or peanut butter coxing? Peanut

32:05

butter puffins I have tried those are very good.

32:07

Yeah, I'm gonna try peanut butter. I would recommend

32:09

it Yeah,

32:14

I you know the Seabury crunch Was

32:17

kind of disappointing but whatever it's

32:19

fine. I'm gonna be okay. I don't want

32:21

to worry about it We

32:25

have a breaking a Breaking

32:29

new segment here Dan. Can you tell me

32:31

about? Corn

32:33

watch now, this is a segment

32:35

that I hope never has to recur again I hope

32:37

this is the only time I ever have to bring

32:39

up corn watch But this

32:42

is speaking to a dangerous new phenomenon that

32:44

people are pointing out in the cereal aisle

32:47

I mentioned in my

32:49

review of the Cheerios blends the

32:51

the vegetable Cheerios that amongst

32:54

the classical oat ingredients they

32:56

had also started putting corn into

32:59

these Cheerios blends and I

33:02

Was hoping that this was just going to be

33:04

an isolated Trend

33:06

amongst the Cheerios blends line, but

33:08

then I got a troubling email

33:10

from a listener named David who?

33:13

Pointed out to me that sometime in

33:15

the past couple years general Mills has

33:18

begun mixing corn even into regular

33:20

Lucky charms like we knew what

33:23

we knew that lucky charms had

33:25

been using corn pieces for their

33:27

limited edition Lucky charms, but kind

33:30

of just assumed that the sanctity of the

33:32

original lucky charms had been preserved But

33:34

that is not the case the encroaching

33:37

maze menace is starting

33:39

to influence even the most iconically

33:41

oded cereals And

33:43

so this is just a

33:45

little watchdog alert that everybody

33:48

needs to stay Keep your

33:50

eyes peeled if you notice any Unexpected

33:54

corn ingredients in your

33:56

favorite previously uncorned cereal,

33:58

please let us know at May Mail at bowl

34:00

dot rest immediately. Please. And

34:03

hopefully to- You should check at home. Honestly,

34:05

if you're eating a cereal that you think

34:07

is oat, you need to check now. Alright.

34:10

This is worse than the Salmonella outbreak. Yeah. It's

34:13

10pm. Do you know where your oats are? Because

34:16

they may not be in your lucky charms, believe

34:18

it or not. They're

34:21

still out, but it's just- Slowly.

34:24

I feel like they could maybe work

34:26

at a pace where it's like boiling-

34:28

slowly boiling the lobster. Yeah,

34:30

for real. Eventually, it never even- it doesn't

34:32

even say wheat, or it doesn't even say

34:34

anymore, and you're like, man, this is still-

34:36

it's just exactly the same as I remember

34:39

from childhood. There's like this one viral science

34:41

fair project this kid did where it's like,

34:43

how much sawdust can I mix into Rice

34:45

Krispie Street before someone notices? And it seems

34:47

like that's what they're doing now. Yeah.

34:52

I'd rather have the sawdust. Yeah, for real. This

34:54

is hearty. Um, this is cute. Um,

34:57

this is cute. Uh, this is like a

34:59

fun- fun, uh, little thing.

35:01

Um, thanks to Daniel for putting

35:03

this on, uh, on

35:05

X. But we, uh, we were in

35:07

the Apple News crossword. Yeah, a

35:10

couple people pointed that out to me

35:12

that in the Apple News Plus crossword,

35:14

there's a clue about food

35:16

discussed on the podcast The Empty Bowl.

35:18

With of course the answer being cereal.

35:21

And it just seems like this

35:23

is very obscure for most mainstream

35:25

crossword puzzlers to be able to

35:27

know. Well, let's call it what it

35:29

is. A listener of our podcast

35:32

definitely is one of the writers

35:34

of that puzzle. There's absolutely no

35:36

alternative. And if

35:38

they are listening now, uh, thank you for

35:40

that. Um, anybody who wants

35:43

to work, uh, The

35:45

Empty Bowl into any kind of media that

35:47

helps elevate it into the national conversation. I

35:49

mean, we are, we're obviously

35:51

thrilled and flattered. Yeah, thank you. Jeopardy

35:53

clue? That would be cool. That

35:55

would be, that's the dream. What

36:00

else, Dan, in this 100th episode

36:02

spectacular? Let's answer all the questions

36:04

that people will have for us.

36:07

Yeah, so in a couple episodes ago

36:09

when we did our impromptu lightning round,

36:11

where I just invented questions that I

36:13

thought people could possibly ask, our

36:17

listeners responded with an

36:19

absolute torrential downpour of

36:21

questions. So I

36:24

lined up a whole ton of them for us

36:26

here. We can answer as many as we have

36:28

enough stamina for. Starting

36:31

now. Good

36:35

evening, Dan and Justin. There's something I ponder as I

36:37

listen to your podcast before bed some nights. It would

36:39

enjoy hearing your answer. If you were shrunk down to

36:41

the size of a pencil eraser, what cereal would you

36:43

most like to play in? Bury yourself

36:45

in dry brown Fruity Pebbles, scramble across

36:48

some frosted mini-weets, float in a cherry

36:50

across some honeyed milk, and

36:53

thank you for your peaceful show.

36:55

Nice from Benji. That's a

36:57

great question. I love to think about playing

37:00

around on a bunch of cereal like a jungle.

37:02

Yeah, it's fun to think about. I

37:04

feel like you could swing around a Chex piece

37:06

very nicely. You could go inside of it and

37:08

sort of like. So you're really small. Like

37:12

how. See, in my mind. See,

37:17

in my mind, I had only been shrunk to

37:19

a scale where I could use a Chex piece

37:21

as a life preserver. Oh, it does say that.

37:23

And you are at a scale where, you

37:26

are at a different scale where you are more

37:29

of an ant-man style. Yeah,

37:31

I think that's more fun. I

37:33

think we could be any size we want to in

37:35

our imaginations though, Dan. I don't want to be limiting

37:37

for anybody. Like I want to be able to use

37:39

like a go inside of a Crispix and use it

37:42

like one of those giant human hamster balls. How

37:44

different do you think it would taste? At

37:48

that the cereal. I mean, do you think it would

37:50

taste different if you were smaller? I would assume at

37:53

a certain molecular level you can parse out

37:55

the different ingredients

37:58

better. I guess maybe I could. find

38:00

and eat around the different plasticy

38:02

bits on my s'mores crunch cereal

38:04

that way. Maybe we come abundantly

38:06

obvious to you at that scale

38:08

what the problem with the cereal

38:10

is. Yeah. Let's see, what else

38:12

would be fun? I think,

38:16

well, definitely not a cap and crunch piece, because

38:18

that's just like stepping on a Lego at that

38:20

size, or it's like stepping on razor wire, I

38:22

would imagine. It might

38:25

be fun to be

38:28

inside one of these new filled cereals, to

38:31

have one of these to set up camp in, because

38:33

then you might just have like, you know, you can

38:35

dig through the cereal and you know you got a

38:37

little treat, a little vanilla treat waiting for you. I

38:39

feel like it'd be kind of like being inside one

38:42

of those sensory deprivation tanks, where

38:44

you're just floating in milky cream.

38:46

Yeah. But it could be interesting. You'd really

38:48

be living cereal rich at that point. That's

38:50

what it is. That's a story you can

38:52

submit there in 12 days for sure. Inspired

38:55

by Dan's World Peace cereal question, what

38:57

cereal would you give to an alien

38:59

for their first breakfast on Earth? We

39:01

propose Fruit Loops. Thanks

39:04

for the great show, Santa and Caitlin.

39:06

It does seem to me that like

39:08

something like a Fruit Loops or a

39:10

Crunch Berry is the most like mind-blowing

39:13

example of just like synthetic fruits

39:16

that we've cultivated here in our

39:18

breakfast cereals. Yeah. Though I'd also

39:20

be inclined to let

39:22

them try like a crackling oat

39:24

brand, just really blow their mind

39:27

from the get-go. Oh, that could

39:29

ruin Earth cereals for them forever.

39:31

The crackling oat. They

39:33

tried crackling oat brand first. I feel

39:35

like I would do Fruity Pebbles with

39:38

marshmallows, just because it's, I really want

39:40

to stunt on them early. You know

39:42

what I mean? I want them to

39:44

know exactly what kind of planet they're

39:47

on. And I feel like that one

39:49

really, either that or the Honey Brunch's

39:51

vote, Maple Bay, just like to

39:53

know how kind of nasty we are on this

39:56

planet, how far we're willing to go. I think

39:59

that was it. help to protect us, honestly.

40:01

These kinds of advantages. Yeah, I feel like

40:03

that's kind of like the twist at an

40:05

end of an alien movie where you discover

40:07

that the alien's secret weakness is like synthetic

40:09

pork flavor or something like that. I'm

40:13

also curious, like if we were to present

40:15

them a box of Quisp, could we pass

40:17

that off as like something another alien left

40:19

behind? Yeah,

40:22

this is the progenitors left

40:25

in the foundational text

40:29

of her culture. Let's

40:34

see here. Oh, my... Yeah, I already answered

40:36

that. Hi, my serial question is, do you

40:38

have any serial rituals slash traditions? For example,

40:40

I always use the same spoon to eat

40:42

my serial. Another example could be

40:44

always eating cereal at a certain time or in

40:46

a certain place. Love

40:48

the show, wishing you all the best, Garrett.

40:53

What about Dan? Dan, do you... I feel like we've

40:55

talked some about this before. What's your... Do you have

40:57

a serial ritual? I

41:00

feel like my serial ritualism has

41:02

declined over time. I used to

41:04

be like really

41:07

weirdly dedicated to using wooden bowls

41:09

and wooden spoons while I eat

41:11

my cereal. I don't even know

41:14

necessarily why. It almost

41:16

seemed like the flavor would seep into the bowl

41:18

at certain points. So I don't know if I

41:21

was ever really adequately

41:23

cleaning that or if I was just kind

41:25

of like taking a cast iron approach where

41:27

my wooden bowls started to absorb

41:29

the essence of a thousand bowls of

41:31

cereal at a certain point. I

41:36

think now it's more a matter

41:38

of maintaining and

41:40

preserving the right balance of or

41:42

the right ratio rather of milk

41:44

to cereal. No one

41:47

I've met in my life

41:49

necessarily maintains the same ratio

41:52

that I do where I like a

41:54

little bit less than 50-50 milk to

41:56

cereal, probably like 40-35 to 40-40. 40%

42:01

milk to cereal just

42:03

because I like having a

42:05

crisp layer on top that sort

42:08

of gets more sedimentarily soggy as

42:10

I go down. Okay. Well,

42:12

that could also be the case of like for

42:16

a long time I was using like

42:18

milk alternatives like almond milk and oat

42:20

milk and I just found that the

42:22

end milk left behind with milk

42:25

alternatives like that isn't really as

42:27

satisfying to drink up. So

42:29

I wasn't really wanting to

42:32

leave as much milk behind as

42:34

to now I'll get like

42:36

the lactose free still

42:38

dairy milk and that's just

42:40

reinvigorated my desire to drink

42:43

the proverbial milk you know and I think now

42:45

I'm willing to give it a little bit more

42:47

milk. And again

42:50

like I was alluding to time of

42:52

day definitely like after dark it does

42:54

seem like eating cereal is

42:56

something private that should be done under

42:58

the curtain of darkness alone

43:00

in my own home. Yes, 100%. How

43:03

about you? Yeah, I mean I

43:06

almost always eat cereal. It is very rare that I

43:08

eat cereal while the sun is up. I

43:13

tend to stick to the

43:15

evening actually my ritual usually is my wife

43:17

will go to sleep usually

43:19

around 11 and then that's when we both go

43:21

to sleep. But right

43:24

before I come to bed I'll set

43:26

myself up with a bowl

43:28

of cereal I've been looking forward to and

43:30

I'll turn on a YouTube video that

43:33

I know my wife doesn't care about

43:35

like sometimes it's like Disney news lately

43:37

I've been listening to watching this channel

43:39

called Technology Connection which is just this

43:41

dude talking in detail about

43:43

things like why our electrical

43:47

plugs have little holes on

43:49

them and why our dishwashers

43:52

or dishwasher pods are

43:54

inefficient and it's extremely nerdy stuff

43:56

but that's exactly the kind of

43:58

thing that I like. It used to

44:00

be cereal time. Honestly, I used to love to look

44:02

forward to on Saturday's a new cereal time episode used

44:05

to be my go-to But with

44:07

that no longer in production That

44:10

is that is my that is my ritual

44:12

and then the last part of my ritual

44:14

that has been hard-learned is

44:16

that I do Always wash

44:18

my bowl after I

44:21

finish eating because very early in

44:23

our relationship, especially there's some cereals

44:26

The fruity pebbles are the number one

44:28

I think where if you leave them

44:31

in the bowl and they dry out

44:33

they're not coming off again like that

44:35

I know it's absolutely not the part

44:37

of a bowl and that really really

44:39

irritated geologic formation It

44:42

really irritated my wife because she would end up

44:44

you know, she would end up cleaning it out

44:46

the next morning good Lee she would

44:48

end up like leaving those bowls and Eventually,

44:50

I got the message like okay, no more

44:52

leaving cereal in the bowl So that is

44:54

the start of my ritual when

44:56

do you think popular opinion pivoted

44:59

on cereal as a night versus

45:01

daytime food? Like what was the

45:03

catalyst there? I? Think

45:06

and you know, we don't talk a lot about

45:08

nutrition on this show and I think that that's

45:10

by design but I do think that this

45:13

sort of illusion of The

45:16

well-balanced healthy breakfast that was and that you'd

45:18

see depicted where it's like a bowl of

45:21

cereal Of all the

45:23

fruit loops a slice of toast a glass

45:25

of orange juice. Yeah, you're ready You're

45:27

ready to power through the day. I

45:30

think that that we all kind of realized that was a bit

45:32

of a gimmick At least

45:34

like adults. I think that when you're

45:36

a kid friggin go nuts, man Absolutely.

45:38

You have that cereal for breakfast, but

45:40

I think that like maybe adults we

45:42

needed You

45:44

know the late the late night Decadence

45:49

rather than a way of starting our day It

45:51

does feel like that like when I turned 18 like

45:54

a switch flipped in my brain where

45:56

I suddenly was not interested in sweet

45:58

breakfast foods at all anymore Interesting.

46:05

Let's see here. Everyone knows the Saturday

46:08

morning cartoons are the perfect pair. What was

46:10

your favorite Saturday morning cartoon to watch while

46:13

eating cereal as a kid? That's from Mel.

46:16

Well, we are from very different age brackets here.

46:18

So I will

46:21

say that, let's say I

46:24

have a serial related cartoon

46:27

related injury. When

46:29

I was four years old, I

46:31

was eating a bowl

46:34

of Cap'n Crunch at my dining room table

46:37

because that's where I had to eat. I was watching

46:39

an episode of He-Man that I was really loving. So

46:41

at four years old, I attempted

46:43

to push the TV around so

46:46

that I could watch it. When I

46:48

did that, I actually pushed the TV over

46:51

onto my finger and really

46:54

destroyed it. I had to go in to

46:56

get surgery and have the nail reattached and

46:58

everything. That

47:00

really it

47:03

was brutal, right? But

47:05

that was like my, it's

47:07

my most prevalent serial Saturday

47:10

morning cartoon memory. I'll say that I

47:13

also used to love because we're talking about nostalgia

47:15

at this point. This is probably before your time,

47:17

but when I

47:20

was young Saturday morning cartoons

47:22

were only on on Saturday mornings. Like

47:24

this was predating like that

47:26

being a thing on cable, 24 hour a day cartoons.

47:30

They would regularly be before a

47:32

new season would start on

47:35

the Friday night before they would do

47:37

like a half hour

47:40

sort of sneak preview of what the new cartoons

47:42

would be like. They do

47:45

it with the casts of like

47:47

TGIF or whoever their sitcom stars

47:49

were. There's a convoluted plot, such

47:52

as it is connecting all these

47:54

like vignettes, but it always ends up like

47:56

how can we show commercials for all of

47:58

our cartoons? to adore

48:01

watching those when I was a kid. It was

48:03

such a highlight to look forward to seeing these

48:06

previews of the new cartoons. You can still find a

48:08

lot of these on YouTube. They're an absolute trip. And

48:11

you can see ads for cartoons

48:13

that never really caught on. They're

48:16

not really part of the public mindscape.

48:18

Like one old

48:20

preview, like the Rubik's Cube cartoon

48:22

or the Alf cartoon or whatever.

48:26

Was there really a Rubik's Cube cartoon? Yeah,

48:28

yeah. They put a face on him and

48:31

everything was great. Also, do you

48:33

still have scars from that serial injury? I

48:35

do, yeah. I can see your

48:38

pic later if you'd like to do a

48:40

serial-related scar. That's so metal. I do, yeah.

48:43

Never really thought about it, but you know. Yeah,

48:47

I mean, that really seems like it

48:49

was the golden age of watching cartoons

48:51

that you could watch while eating a

48:53

serial based on that same cartoon. Very

48:56

very. That I'm kind of envious of.

48:58

I think my go-tos were, I was

49:00

like a four kids TV kind of

49:02

kid. So I was always watching Yu-Gi-Oh!

49:05

And like the Kirby animated series was kind

49:07

of my all time favorite as well to

49:09

get you into that sort of head space.

49:12

Never got a Kirby serial though. Real

49:14

disappointing. It'd be

49:16

such a good one. Hey

49:21

Dan and Justin, just listened to your latest

49:24

episode and enjoyed it very much. I appreciate

49:26

your gentle tone and friendly camaraderie. Somewhat

49:28

related to the questions you asked in these

49:30

episode, I've often found myself wondering to what

49:32

extent you all are collectors of serial items.

49:34

That is, you save serial boxes, collect old

49:36

premiums related items, buy t-shirts or mugs or

49:38

key chains or whatnot that are currently for

49:41

sale. I do some of the above

49:43

but wondered where you all fell in that area. Thanks for

49:45

a delightful show, Tom. What about you, Dan? I

49:47

know Gabe, who we mentioned, you know, serial

49:50

time and the one time one

49:52

episode co-hosted this program, Big Serial

49:54

Box Collector. What's your, you do

49:56

any collecting? I definitely don't

49:58

do any systematic collecting. There was

50:00

one point like when I first started my blog that I

50:02

was like I'm gonna save every

50:05

single cereal box that I review on this blog

50:07

so I have a record of that and Then

50:10

I realized that I'd be hopping between different

50:12

college dorms and I'm still a renter to

50:14

this day So I just do not have room for

50:17

any of that sort of thing at all So

50:21

I just more have different

50:23

piecemeal trinkets and fun oddities

50:27

From cereal history that are either gifts or

50:29

things that I've acquired from Via

50:31

promotions or that like companies have sent me

50:34

so I do have if you

50:36

know where to look around my apartment some really fun

50:39

Odds and ends there like I've got you

50:41

know some of the more interesting boxes like

50:43

the green onion checks or like that red

50:47

bean cereal the Korean ones as well

50:49

as the Oreo South

50:51

Korean Oreos box. I've got my

50:53

Neopets island berry crunch I've

50:57

got you know like some plushies of snap

50:59

crackle and pop like an actual Like

51:02

spoon with Cheerios and milk on

51:04

it. That's been preserved in resin

51:07

I've got one of the things I got

51:09

on my desk that I'm a big fan of is like You

51:12

know like those 25 cent quarter machines Yeah

51:16

at one point they were doing this

51:18

robot supermart With these little

51:20

plastic robots that just have like pictures

51:23

of consumer based products on them And

51:26

so there's like a special K robot

51:28

and like a sunflakes and frosting flakes

51:30

frosted oak flakes robots And

51:32

so this is like the backer from one of

51:34

those machines that is just extremely colorful and

51:37

nice to look at and then

51:39

probably You know I got

51:42

some other things, but one of the most interesting

51:44

pieces of cereal ephemera that I own is like

51:46

a signed a

51:49

signed photo of vanilla ice and cap

51:51

and crunch together signed

51:54

by by vanilla ice okay, all right, which

51:56

was like a contest that I entered to

51:58

win and like Right as

52:00

the contest was being held, Vanilla Ice got

52:02

into some legal trouble, so they canceled the

52:04

contest, despite telling me that I won. So

52:07

I had to follow up with Cap'n Crunch personally and

52:09

ask for my photo, which he... So,

52:12

Dan, it would be my pleasure to send

52:14

it along! And that he did, and I

52:16

have it framed now. Do

52:18

you have anything interesting like that? You know, I don't

52:20

do- I don't like you. I don't do- I

52:23

don't do any systematic collecting, honestly. I used

52:25

to- In my younger days,

52:27

but, um... I like

52:30

oddball stuff, like, um... When

52:32

there's, uh, Monster's merch, sometimes I'll get some of

52:34

those, because I get a kick out of it.

52:36

Um... I do enjoy-

52:40

Whenever I see, like, cereal apparel that

52:42

I would actually wear, um... Shoes

52:45

are probably the biggest one, you know, we

52:47

had those, like, Frosted Flakes Pumas and the

52:50

LeBron... ...Pebbles... ...release

52:52

that I got both of those, just because I like

52:54

that kind of thing. Um, but by

52:57

and large, no, I'm not a big... ...big

52:59

collector. Do you still work those

53:01

shoes into your regular rotation? Honestly,

53:04

I use them- I save them for,

53:06

like, shows, or, like, live appearances or

53:08

whatever. Uh-uh. Not a around-town

53:11

kind of thing. I wanna preserve their

53:13

sanctity. Even crisp. Yeah,

53:15

exactly. Dear

53:20

Dan and Justin, I hope you're both doing well. We are.

53:24

I am. Uh-huh. You know, we're recording this

53:26

podcast. Yeah. Hey, Dan and

53:28

Justin. Which cereal do you personally identify with?

53:30

What would be you as a cereal? Can

53:33

be made up or an already existing cereal,

53:35

despite it being far from my favorite. I

53:37

personally identify with Cocobobs. Cheerio,

53:39

Lizzie. So, Dan, if you were a

53:42

cereal... ...what cereal would you be?

53:45

I mean, it's hard to imagine, spiritually,

53:48

soulfully speaking, existentially even, that I wouldn't

53:50

be Neopets Island Berry Crunch, just because

53:52

of- Sure. ...more or less the cereal

53:55

that made me, uh, and who I

53:57

am today. Uh, but

54:00

I guess- just like going beyond

54:02

nostalgia and personal connection, I do

54:04

feel... Oh,

54:07

that is a tough one. Like

54:10

Oreo always has a lot of my heart too, like

54:12

I feel like I'm... No,

54:15

that doesn't seem quite right. Let

54:20

me think on it, let me think on it. What do you got? Okay.

54:23

Um... Part

54:27

of me feels like I'm kind of

54:29

like Quaker Oatsquares. Like,

54:31

it seems kind of boring and

54:33

that's fair and not wrong,

54:36

I guess. But like,

54:38

you get used to it. Like,

54:41

there's a sweetness there, you know, there's a

54:43

heartiness that's heartier than you think it will

54:45

be. It's sweeter than you think it

54:47

will be. But,

54:50

you know, you would be absolutely forgiven for

54:52

thinking like, there's not

54:54

much here, I don't know. Seems

54:57

not my taste. I think maybe I'd

54:59

be Golden Grands. Like, there's

55:01

a certain niche appeal there that like,

55:03

people love Golden Grands, doesn't

55:06

have the bombastic star power of Cinnamon Toast

55:08

Crunch, but good old Golden

55:10

Grands will always be there for you. Not

55:13

too outlandish or loud, but like, really

55:16

sweet deep down with a heart of gold. Yeah.

55:22

Um, let's see here. Uh,

55:24

is there a cereal you think could benefit from having a pinch of

55:26

salt sprinkled over it? Sweet

55:28

and salty is nothing new, but sometimes I find

55:30

the satisfying combination met in surprising ways and places.

55:34

Thanks, Grant. Now,

55:36

this is a really interesting forefront in

55:38

cereal engineering, I think. I,

55:42

my struggle with adding

55:44

salt to a cereal, and I've not done it yet,

55:46

but I'm a big fan of salt and like, desserts

55:48

and what have you, but

55:50

I feel like unless it was baked

55:53

into the cereal itself,

55:56

I think that your, the salt would immediately sort

55:58

of just become a cereal. part of the milk

56:01

rather than adhere to the pieces in any

56:03

meaningful way and you just end up with

56:05

like a salty milk that wouldn't be great.

56:07

That is my concern. Right.

56:12

I do think that, yeah, that's difficult.

56:15

Like the only really, like if you're

56:17

doing like aftermarket salt, I mean, I

56:19

mean every cereal is going to have

56:21

some level of sodium in it. Like

56:23

I'm looking at the

56:26

Cheerios, Hardin, and Medley and there's definitely

56:28

sodium in it. So I

56:30

don't know how exactly that's working.

56:32

I mean, this cereal does have almonds in

56:34

it, which I would guess probably wouldn't bear

56:36

a lot of that salt, but the

56:39

only cereal I can think of that outright

56:41

made like salt part of its appeal where

56:43

those honey branches of oats cereals with like

56:45

the chicken and waffles. Yeah. Which in that

56:47

case, the chicken and waffles one I think

56:49

did salt well. Obviously not the maple bacon

56:51

donuts so much, but if I

56:54

were to think of existing cereals that could

56:56

use a bit more salt, I'd honestly say

56:58

like Reese's Puffs. Like that's the

57:00

one thing that I think Cap'n

57:02

Crunch's Peanut Butter Crunch does a little bit better

57:04

as a peanut butter cereal. It's got a little

57:06

more saltiness to it. Like I think I like

57:09

the flavor of Reese's Puffs more overall, but

57:12

if it had a little bit more of

57:14

that nutty nuance with the salt, it could

57:16

elevate it to an even higher level. Yeah,

57:20

I think those Oak Crunch cereals would be

57:22

nice with a more of a salt

57:24

note. I

57:27

really love like hot buttered Cheerios.

57:29

Oh, yeah. It's sort of like what we're talking about.

57:32

Yeah. Yeah, it's

57:34

old school. So

57:37

that those would be the ones that I would

57:39

I would lean towards. Tell you what,

57:43

how do we do one more? We're almost at an

57:45

hour here. Hello.

57:48

I've recently been craving a Stroup Waffle

57:50

Cereal. I imagine it would be caramel-covered,

57:52

Spiced Waffle Crisp or Eggo Waffle style

57:55

cereal. My question is, what

57:57

obscure cookie would you most like to see turn into

57:59

a cereal? That's from

58:01

Rit. I

58:06

would love, love, love, love,

58:08

and I'm honestly, as much as

58:10

I've seen it, like, it's

58:13

becoming more of a flavor in the mainstream,

58:15

but like, a Biscoff.

58:19

Yeah, I call him plain cookie. My kids

58:21

call him plain cookie, so I just love

58:23

Biscoff, you know? Like

58:25

cookie butter, you're starting to see that flavor

58:27

pop up more frequently, and I feel like

58:30

a Biscoff cereal would be

58:33

very choice. It would be hard to get

58:35

the texture right, because the texture should be

58:37

part of those cookies, but that

58:40

would be one I'd be incredibly excited

58:42

for. Man, imagine if airlines for early

58:44

morning flights would, instead of giving you

58:46

the cookies, they'd give you a little

58:48

Biscoff cereal box. Unbelievable.

58:50

That's a big idea right there. My

58:54

immediate thing is that I think we need to

58:56

run it back. We need to

58:58

mulligan on gingerbread cereals. I'm not

59:00

satisfied with gingerbread toast crunch being

59:02

like the defining model for gingerbread

59:04

cereals. I think we need an

59:08

actual gingerbread man-shaped

59:10

cookie piece cereal,

59:13

and that would be the case where I

59:15

think, like, you could repurpose this loaded cereal

59:17

technology. Like a loaded gingerbread man

59:19

cereal would really bring in that element

59:22

of creaminess, like you would get with the frosting

59:24

on a gingerbread man. I think that

59:26

would be the best elevation

59:28

and evolution of that idea. As

59:31

for more

59:33

obscure, in my family

59:35

we make a lot of O'Henry bars, which are

59:37

like these peanut

59:40

butter oat bars with a layer of

59:42

creamy chocolate on top, too. I

59:45

think having like, if you

59:47

were to take basically a peanut butter

59:49

kashi, which kind of has that crumbly

59:52

peanut butteriness to it, add

59:54

some loose oats to that as well, and

59:56

then get some like, I

59:58

don't know, maybe like a chocolate cookie. crave style.

1:00:00

Maybe if it's just like, hear

1:00:04

me out here, like I am, I have

1:00:06

no choice. A

1:00:08

peanut butter crave shell with chocolate inside

1:00:11

and then you load it up like

1:00:13

it's a Cheerios oat crunch with oats

1:00:15

on the outside. Mmm, yeah, it's delivered.

1:00:17

That's my cookie cereal. Yeah, that one's

1:00:19

for free folks. It's

1:00:24

been a hundred episodes of this.

1:00:26

It all started with me reading

1:00:28

seriously and thinking this is this

1:00:31

person is an absolutely

1:00:33

singular talent. I've never seen anyone

1:00:35

who talks about something I love

1:00:38

like Dan does. I

1:00:40

think he's an incredible writer

1:00:43

and a even better

1:00:45

friend and these hundred episodes have been such

1:00:48

a joy making

1:00:50

something I'm really proud of whenever I hear

1:00:52

someone say they like to relax with this

1:00:54

show and I so appreciate everybody who has

1:00:56

been here with us and supported the show

1:00:59

and listened to the episodes. It

1:01:01

really means a lot. Yes, thank you so

1:01:03

much Justin for reaching out to begin

1:01:05

with. I had no idea when I

1:01:07

started writing manic musings about serial online

1:01:09

that it would come this far and

1:01:11

that this podcast has honestly changed

1:01:14

my life in many tangible ways. I've made a

1:01:16

lot of great friends through the show. I've received

1:01:18

a lot of great opportunities and

1:01:20

I've gotten to hear from so many great

1:01:23

people as well about how this show has helped

1:01:25

them sleep, helped them calm down. So I'm

1:01:27

eternally grateful to both you and all our

1:01:30

listeners for helping us to get this far.

1:01:33

Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much

1:01:35

for listening. If you'd

1:01:37

like to support the show, there's never

1:01:39

been a better time. Mail.

1:01:43

Mail.bull.rest is our email address supporting the

1:01:45

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1:01:47

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1:01:49

month to ten bucks a month and

1:01:52

we really really appreciate that support.

1:01:54

It's very meaningful to us. Who else

1:01:56

do we have gratitude to today? We'd

1:01:58

like to thank Chris Zabriskie for opening

1:02:00

theme of The Sun is Scheduled to come out

1:02:02

tomorrow, Brie Davis for our

1:02:04

amazing podcast branding, and

1:02:06

Loper and Samuel Rarden for designing our empty

1:02:09

bowl merchandise, and for our

1:02:11

dear listeners once again, for all their support

1:02:13

throughout the years. Thank

1:02:15

you. That will do it for

1:02:17

us for this 100th episode, and

1:02:19

as we say every week, for

1:02:22

the hundredth time, don't forget

1:02:24

to drink the milk. Thank

1:02:30

you. Thank

1:03:00

you. Thank

1:03:30

you.