I remember the baffling dilemma of breakfast cereal as a kid. It was before the days of "nutritional eating"--what the heck did we know (or care) about carbs or fiber or childhood obesity? Well, maybe the latter as I squeezed into my "chubby" size clothes.

All I knew was that I had a deep and abiding love for Frosted Flakes and Tony the Tiger. That, like Boo Boo the bear, I couldn't get enough of that Sugar Crisp. That I kept begging my mom for the "new" Lucky Charms cereal with marshmallow stars and clover and then wouldn't eat it because it wasn't sweet enough.

Was breakfast cereal marketed to kids way back in the day? You bet it was.

So, as King Solomon notes, there's nothing new under the sun, and it should come as no surprise that General Mills has rolled out a new group of breakfast cereals to be produced in conjunction with Disney.


The new Disney-themed breakfast cereals includes Princess Fairytale Flakes, which are coated in pink sugar; Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Berry Crunch, which contains no real berries; Honey B's, a honey-graham concoction; and Little Einstein Fruity Stars, which are about as fruity as Froot Loops (another of my childhood favorites). All three cereals, say the folks at General Mills, "are made from whole-grain corn" and are "lightly sweetened." All to make not-so-savvy consumers think of them as "healthy."

And here's the kicker. In a day when a box of breakfast cereal can run you $4, the cereals will retail for $1.99 a box, appealing not only to the clamoring sugar-crazed toddlers but the wallets of their parents.

They're sure to be a hit.