Everyone’s talking about... Cornf lakes

KELLOGG’S is hitting back at rules classing some cereals as junk food, arguing sugar levels should be measured only after milk is added. On their own, Crunchy Nut cornflakes are 35 per cent sugar. So what’s the story of cornflakes?

They were created in 1894 by brothers John and Will Kellogg, wellness gurus who ran a retreat in Michigan. A pious Seventh-Day Adventist, John advocated a healthy diet to stop ‘deviant’, lustful thoughts. One night he accidentally left some dough out – and one of the family had the idea of rolling it into flakes to be baked. A row over exactly who had this epiphany caused a family rift. John won the patent. Will added sugar to make the product, originally called Granose, more palatable.

How were they marketed?

In 1907, a campaign offered a free box of Kellogg’s cornflakes to any woman who winked at her grocer. A rooster called Cornelius became the logo in 1957. That’s credited to Welsh harpist Nansi Richards noticing that Kellogg’s was similar to ‘ceiliog’, Welsh for cockerel.

Who likes them?

So many people! Britons eat a billion bowls of Kellogg’s cornflakes each year. The Queen is said to start every day with cornflakes, and they were eaten by astronauts on Apollo 11. Blogger Mick Hobday is trying to eat a local version in every nation. Of 82 visited so far, he says Albania has the worst, tasting ‘like smoke’. Artist Anne Griffiths collects individual flakes and pins them to boards, like a butterfly-hunter.

But I don’t like the way the flakes go soggy…

They are working on that! A 1995 paper into how milk ‘smoothed their compressive force-displacement curves’ won the IgNobel prize for dubious research. Biotech giant Monsanto has ploughed millions into developing a maize that would make more resilient flakes.

And other variants?

Frosties – which sitcom Peep Show called ‘cornflakes for people who can’t face reality’ – launched in 1952, and the Crunchy Nut version was created at the Kellogg’s Manchester factory in 1980. There’s even a beer: Seven Bro7hers Brewery makes an IPA from Kellogg’s leftovers. Maybe Tommy Cooper was on to something. Once at a hotel breakfast, he asked for gin – then poured it on his cornflakes, claiming it was healthier than milk.