Why is cereal a breakfast staple?

[Torn Mind]

Topic is that question.

 

[sdifox]

I guess you never heard of Google. It's was due to marketing.

How Cereal Became the Quintessential American Breakfast

Cereal's position as America's default breakfast food is a remarkable feat, not of flavor or culture, but of marketing and packaging design. Here's how it all went down.

www.seriouseats.com

 

[RPD]

Also is there an easier food to prep first thing in the morning? Doesn't make it good or healthy, but barrier to entry is about as low as it gets.

 

[deadlyapp]

Also is there an easier food to prep first thing in the morning? Doesn't make it good or healthy, but barrier to entry is about as low as it gets.

Hard boiled egg, cooked chicken sausage, cooked ham/canadian bacon.

I get it that cereal is a less than 30 second meal but all of the above takes less than 3-5 minutes to prepare. Even a damn omelet takes less than 5 minutes to prepare if whatever you add to it is already cooked / doesn't need to be cooked.

People kill me when they say they don't have time for breakfast in the morning. Seriously? You can't wake up 10-15 minutes earlier to have a real meal and sit down? Unless you're leaving for work at 5 am I really hate that excuse.

 

[RPD]

Hard boiled egg, cooked chicken sausage, cooked ham/canadian bacon.

I get it that cereal is a less than 30 second meal but all of the above takes less than 3-5 minutes to prepare. Even a damn omelet takes less than 5 minutes to prepare if whatever you add to it is already cooked / doesn't need to be cooked.

People kill me when they say they don't have time for breakfast in the morning. Seriously? You can't wake up 10-15 minutes earlier to have a real meal and sit down? Unless you're leaving for work at 5 am I really hate that excuse.

Oh trust me I'm with you, if I do eat breakfast, it's scrambled eggs. But society has people so trained that if it's not put a box in the microwave, press a button and a meal, probably doesn't happen. So that's why cereal is so attractive, you pour a box, pour some milk and you have a "meal".

 

[deadlyapp]

Oh trust me I'm with you, if I do eat breakfast, it's scrambled eggs. But society has people so trained that if it's not put a box in the microwave, press a button and a meal, probably doesn't happen. So that's why cereal is so attractive, you pour a box, pour some milk and you have a "meal".

Oh absolutely. And generally reinforced as a kid, where fun, sugary cereals hook you and it just becomes a habit. Don't get me wrong, I regularly have cereal for breakfast (usually a small portion on top of greek yogurt, similar to granola with yogurt) but slamming back 500 calories of pure carbohydrates in the morning is terrible.

 

[mike8675309]

Ask yourself this question... why are "Hard boiled egg, cooked chicken sausage, cooked ham/canadian bacon." considered a breakfast staple for some? Definitely not healthy.

I did a test one day when people said my breakfast smoothies were spiking my insulin, and making me fat.

• 7 medium bananas
• 1/2 cup of frozen mango chunks
• 1/2 cup of frozen strawberries
• 2 tbsp of organic coconut sugar
• 1 plain bagel.
• 2 liters of water

~1171 kcal 284g carbs (145g sugar, 26g fiber) 4.8g fat, 20.5g protein

My fasting glucose was 84, and I did a 2.2 mile run 2 hours before breakfast.
My glucose before breakfast was: 87
My smoothie is split into 2 jugs of around 30oz each.
My glucose after the first jug was (just over 1 hour after starting):107
My glucose after the second jug and the bagel was (about 2 hours after starting breakfast):99
My glucose before lunch was (~3 hours after breakfast): 91

 

[RPD]

Uh..
Eggs, healthy.
Sausage, ham and bacon, healthy.

 

[Shmee]

Cereal is ok, but I agree sausage, eggs, ham and bacon are better.

 

[Hans Gruber]

Do not forget, waffles, pancakes and French Toast. It's not morning without sausage and eggs. I would like to add bacon but it's bad for you. A guilty pleasure. I drink gallons of milk every week. Obviously cereal without milk is not the same.

 

[balloonshark]

October will be 4 years of eating the same thing for breakfast.

1/2 cup oats made with 1/2 smashed banana, chia seeds, flax seeds and berries. Cinnamon or 1 tbsp vanilla plant based protein powder for flavor.

1 piece whole wheat toast with natural peanut butter (no oil)

1 piece of fruit (apple, orange or banana)

 

[Motostu]

Interesting read on the history of cereal.

We always have cereal in the pantry if we want something really quick, but I usually go for a banana along with a bowl with some plain greek yogurt with blueberries and some granola sprinkled over the top.

While I prefer eggs and either bacon or sausage (got eggs everyday at work before WFH because they were cheap), I don't do it everyday at home because the cleanup takes me as long as the cooking.

 

[Torn Mind]

Cereal is ok, but I agree sausage, eggs, ham and bacon are better.

Cereal+milk is toothslayer combo. Carbs are purely a commodity, a little too readily accessible and thus satisfying the requirement is effortless. Horrible nasty to eat if unsweetened...and readily edible if sweetened but then dentists are smiling everytime folks down that combo. I don't know how milk tastes to genetically "ready" beings in Europeans, but for an Asian like me, it is not sweet, but not neutral either. Lactose-free though, is enough to satisfy my sweet tooth.

Pork with preservatives are hawt garbage foods; bacon is a temptation and vice food because it is so delicious. Although the uncured version should be just fine.

 

[Torn Mind]

Oh absolutely. And generally reinforced as a kid, where fun, sugary cereals hook you and it just becomes a habit. Don't get me wrong, I regularly have cereal for breakfast (usually a small portion on top of greek yogurt, similar to granola with yogurt) but slamming back 500 calories of pure carbohydrates in the morning is terrible.

Parents buy it via "Box tops for education". If only they knew they're setting up their kids for perio and Alzheimer's in the future. It's a brutal regiment of sweets everyday that are likely not waterpik'd or flossed after eating, and will sit there from dawn until dusk, unbrushed. Throw in a "lunch" of sweets. Kids are lucky the dedicious teeth are expendable. But if they maintain the habit once the permanent ones set in, it's going to be a miserable old age life.

Nothing better than "altruism" to keep business booming because no one will rebel. Kellogg's might as well be the dentist's Jesus.

 

[Scarpozzi]

A bowl of cereal also only has a bowl and spoon as dishes to wash. The worst part about cooking bacon/sausage is disposing of the grease and cleaning up the pans. The best part is the meal. 😎

 

[Torn Mind]

A bowl of cereal also only has a bowl and spoon as dishes to wash. The worst part about cooking bacon/sausage is disposing of the grease and cleaning up the pans. The best part is the meal. 😎

The saturated fat of bacon is at least more forgiving of "neglect" than the unsaturated fats of veggies; I've eat old bacon fat to no known ill effect(like over a week or two). Let the veggie oil sit too long, and then the unholiest of substances coat the pan, which can then only be removed via chemical reaction by a base such as baking soda.

 

[Torn Mind]

I guess you never heard of Google. It's was due to marketing.

How Cereal Became the Quintessential American Breakfast

Cereal's position as America's default breakfast food is a remarkable feat, not of flavor or culture, but of marketing and packaging design. Here's how it all went down.

www.seriouseats.com

Makes perfect sense that a vegetarian would concoct a starch-ridden food; there's no other way to get vegetables down the chute; fruits are an entirely different matter because they are naturally sweet....

but to convince the average American to do away with that traditional, meat-laden six-course breakfast.

I don't think...the shift....benefitted society....

"nourishment from 1 pound of Grape Nuts than from 10 lbs of MEAT, WHEAT, OATS OR BREAD."

Insert "Haha" smiley here.

More than anything, these cereals promised ease for the American housewife. She could make her life more convenient while still nurturing and providing for her family. And the idea was catching.

Valid point that it freed up women.

Of course, companies kept churning out every iteration of sugar-bomb cereal, but those were now winked at as "part of this complete breakfast." You wouldn't just serve your children Pop Tarts Crunch by itself, but throw in some fruit, orange juice, milk and maybe eggs, and it's a perfectly fine component to include. The Fannie Farmer breakfast resurfaced.

Moar CAVITIES and other dental maladies.

According to NPR, cereal consumption peaked in 1996 and has been on a steady decline ever since.

FOOD PYRAMID POWAHS

 

[Shmee]

Cereal+milk is toothslayer combo. Carbs are purely a commodity, a little too readily accessible and thus satisfying the requirement is effortless. Horrible nasty to eat if unsweetened...and readily edible if sweetened but then dentists are smiling everytime folks down that combo. I don't know how milk tastes to genetically "ready" beings in Europeans, but for an Asian like me, it is not sweet, but not neutral either. Lactose-free though, is enough to satisfy my sweet tooth.

Pork with preservatives are hawt garbage foods; bacon is a temptation and vice food because it is so delicious. Although the uncured version should be just fine.

I am confused as why you would say that, milk is actually good for your teeth quite a bit. Cereal is likely like any food, it can wear down your teeth, but all foods will do that as you chew. I like bacon, I think a lot of people do, but it is also a type of pork. Though other types of pork can also be good. Of course to each their own, you don't HAVE to like anything. It is personal preference.

 

[Torn Mind]

I am confused as why you would say that, milk is actually good for your teeth quite a bit. Cereal is likely like any food, it can wear down your teeth, but all foods will do that as you chew. I like bacon, I think a lot of people do, but it is also a type of pork. Though other types of pork can also be good. Of course to each their own, you don't HAVE to like anything. It is personal preference.

Milk's sugar, lactose, does not taste sweet but it is nevertheless a sugar.. Cereal is loaded with starch and many of the "favorites", like Honey Nut Cherrios and Frosted Flakes, sweeten things up. Milk alone is okay, but it's lack of "flavor" is precisely what then leads to the creation of the sugary cereals like the aforementioned ones; they make the complete "meal" far more palatable to those who don't exactly like plain old milk. The adulterated milk known as Chocolate Milk, which is a preferred option amongst the young and impressionable, is yet another sugar-"enhanced" method of getting kids adults to increase consumption of milk. There is a battle between the local promotion of destructive bacteria in the mouth and the delivery of the beneficial bone-building chemicals to the body.

Even Milk alone should be rinsed away not too long after consumption.

Milk at Bedtime & Tooth Decay | Berkeley Parents Network

www.berkeleyparentsnetwork.org

Parents told stop letting toddlers drink milk in the night

It comes as a survey also found a third of parents believe dried fruit is a healthy snack for children's teeth

www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk

 

[Shmee]

Ooh I like chocolate milk sometimes.

 

[maluckey1]

Sheer marketing genius, social-engineering/construction and money-grabbing of the highest order. I amazed with the ingenuity.....and how gullible the average consumer is/was

My parents (with my urging) fell for the scam in the 70-80's. My breakfasts were cereal, sugar and lots of milk. I moved out in the early 80's never touched cereal or milk again except after a few MTB Epic Rides or after combat missions (psychologically speaking, chocolate milk =love, and childhood memories!).

Cut to 2021....both my kids have grown-up, got married and moved out. We never had cereal or milk in our house (one kid was very allergic to milk). They never knew the almost euphoric rush of sugar from breakfast.....or the two hour later post breakfast coma from sugar crash.

For me? Over 40+ years now, breakfast has typically been left-overs from the night before. It's amazing what you can put inside a tortilla in less than 5 minutes and make it taste GOOD.

 

[mike8675309]

Uh..
Eggs, healthy.
Sausage, ham and bacon, healthy.

Eggs can not legally be advertised as healthy. You'll note they never say they are in their advertising. They can say they are nutritious, simply because they provide nutrition. But they can't claim they are healthy. The others are so obviously not healthy to need no explanation. That doesn't mean you can't eat them for breakfast, but you can't label a breakfast that includes those foods as a healthy one unless you mean healthy in the frame of "a lot" or "many".

I am confused as why you would say that, milk is actually good for your teeth quite a bit. Cereal is likely like any food, it can wear down your teeth, but all foods will do that as you chew. I like bacon, I think a lot of people do, but it is also a type of pork. Though other types of pork can also be good. Of course to each their own, you don't HAVE to like anything. It is personal preference.

There is no evidence that milk is good for your teeth. In fact, there is growing evidence that the more dairy milk you consume, the more risk you accept for negative long-term bone health. Yes, calcium and Vitamin D is good for your teeth, but dairy milk itself is not a premier carrier of those micronutrients.

 

[Torn Mind]

There is no evidence that milk is good for your teeth. In fact, there is growing evidence that the more dairy milk you consume, the more risk you accept for negative long-term bone health. Yes, calcium and Vitamin D is good for your teeth, but dairy milk itself is not a premier carrier of those micronutrients.

12 Frightening Facts About Milk - Center for Nutrition Studies

A large observational cohort study in Sweden found that women consuming more than 3 glasses of milk a day had almost twice the mortality over 20 years compared to those women consuming less than one glass a day.

nutritionstudies.org

A little nuance is that cheese and the like might improve the odds(note nothing is causal). Cheddar would make sense since it improves the oral cavity by making it more basic, helping out beneficial bacteria.

 

[RPD]

Eggs can not legally be advertised as healthy. You'll note they never say they are in their advertising. They can say they are nutritious, simply because they provide nutrition. But they can't claim they are healthy. The others are so obviously not healthy to need no explanation. That doesn't mean you can't eat them for breakfast, but you can't label a breakfast that includes those foods as a healthy one unless you mean healthy in the frame of "a lot" or "many".




There is no evidence that milk is good for your teeth. In fact, there is growing evidence that the more dairy milk you consume, the more risk you accept for negative long-term bone health. Yes, calcium and Vitamin D is good for your teeth, but dairy milk itself is not a premier carrier of those micronutrients.

I don't care if they can or can't be legally advertised as healthy. They are. Is that the bar, because of legal mumbo jumbo (again assuming this is even true) they aren't? You can claim almost ANYTHING is healthy by adding "part of a healthy breakfast". But hey, solid logic!
Can they claim water is healthy? Too much of anything isn't healthy.

 

[Torn Mind]

I don't care if they can or can't be legally advertised as healthy. They are. Is that the bar, because of legal mumbo jumbo (again assuming this is even true) they aren't? You can claim almost ANYTHING is healthy by adding "part of a healthy breakfast". But hey, solid logic!
Can they claim water is healthy? Too much of anything isn't healthy.

It's also relatively easy to seize the means of egg production as long as code allows it, thereby skipping the factory farm conditions.