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Don’t adjust your dials! This IS the Dandy Fun House, but today my good friend, Neil Dandy asked me – COUNT DRAHOON to fill in and guest host this very special HALLOWEEN episode! This will not be your typical Dandy Fun House episode, but instead will be the Count’s SPOOPY, SPOOKY SPOOK SHACK!

And on the Spook Shack today, I am going to do a little tasting of all the classic Monster Cereals and give you my expert opinion on which one is THE BEST! Let’s dive right into THE SPOOK SHACK!

I have great friends, but strange friends. I was honored and yet perplexed to be asked to eat… cereal. VAMPIRES TYPICALLY DON’T EAT CEREAL in case you didn’t already know that little factoid but we’re going to do our best. So what better use to call in a favor from a vampire friend than to have him try MONSTER CEREALS! (I couldn’t think of a better use of my time) so I am here to do a little taste test of these 4 cereals that I have here, put out by General Mills. You’re probably familiar with at least two or three of them.

We have the classic COUNT CHOCULA! Wait a minute… I’ve always thought that this particular Count looked like my cousin Al. And there is a striking resemblance, but I’m not aware of any place in the vampire kingdom that is covered in chocolate. I’ll have to do my research.

Next to Count Chocula we have the FRANKEN BERRY! Which looks like a really offensive caricature of my son, Darrell. But he’s sort of a more berry-infused version of Frankenstein’s Monster. I like the color but I don’t know how I feel about a berry taste.

Basically, what I’m doing for my taste test is that I’m splitting this up in the rules of professional wrestling, or as they say way further south of the Mason Dixon Line, “Rasslin’!” Our main event being Franken Berry vs. Count Chocula preceded by our undercard match with the other two cereals.

Here we have a ghostly little fellow called BOO BERRY! (that’s a delightful little pun!) He’s a bit like Casper but it looks like he maybe had some experience in vaudeville. Maybe he did a vaudeville act where he ate too much cereal and now he’s a ghost, who knows?

And to the right of the Boo Berry we have the FRUTE BRUTE! I’m not really sure why it called a Frute Brute other than it’s a fruity cereal. The Brute isn’t actually a brute, it’s a WEREWOLF! So I’m thinking that maybe the marketing firm at General Mills ran out of rhymes and so had to come up with something on the fly.

And I’d also like to note that there seems to be a disproportionate amount of berryism here. We only have the one sort of savory-sweet cereal with the Count Chocula and then everything else is fruits and berries. I feel like Count Chocula is sort of left to dry out here on his own. Such is the life of a vampire.

HISTORY

The line of monster cereals was actually released in 1971. And spooks and spookettes, if you know your monster movie history, this sort of coincides with the monster movie renaissance of the that was kicked off by famous monsters of filmland. There was a big demand of monster culture and old school monster films. And so General Mills probably felt this was a good opportunity to cash and give us a whole line of monster cereals and thus Count Chocula, Franken Berry and Boo Berry have been with us ever since. These are wildly popular cereals. I DON’T EVEN EAT HUMAN FOOD and I know what they are!

The line also included two othere cereals, Frute Brute and Fruity Yummy Mummy which was actually discontinued sometime in the 80’s and Frute Brute went away for a while as well but this year they brought it back!

So with this feta four-way, let’s dive right into… THE TASTING!

UNDERCARD MATCH! FRUTE BRUTE vs. BOO BERRY!

FRUTE BRUTE: Since they’ve recently resurrected Frute Brute from the dead, I’m going to dive right into the Frute Brute!

Oh, no toy. Now keep in mind that I’m not a cereal conisseur. There’s a first time for everything. It’ looks tasty. It smells very fruity, but is it Brutey? (crunch, crunch..) interesting… so this is cereal.

My favorite part is the marshmallow. I don’t really know what they’re in the shape of so we’ll just call them diamonds. Diamonds are a ghoul’s best fiend. I have to say that marshmallows in the cereal are kind of a strange texture to me. It sent chills down my spine and I don’t know if that’s an appropriate response. The grains of the cereal are sort of in the shape of little ghosts which is disappointing because you would hope they would have something in the shape of the brute like a werewolf.

It’s an enjoyable experience eating food. So far so good. My first time eating cereal. Not bad!

BOO BERRY: And now we go for the contender in this undercard match, the BOO BERRY! I just love that. It’s such a nice pun! Nothing to warm the cold heart of a vampire than a good pun early in the morning!

 

Opening the box of Boo Berry, I notice that the shapes are indentical to Frute Brute but different colors. with Boo Berry you do have more of a variety of marshmallows with little pumpkins, bats and ghosts. A little more going on here. So let’s go ahead and taste this little paparat! (crunch… crunch…)

I don’t know what it is… I seem to be enjoying this one a little more than the Frute Brute which I feel was just Boo Berry dyed a different color. But this one seems like the real deal. This is BOO BERRY! This is what we’ve been looking for all of our lives. The combination of the Holy Grail, Ark of the Covenant, all of that!

UNDERCARD MATCH DECISION: Without a doubt – BOO BERRY!

 

MAIN EVENT! COUNT CHOCULA vs. FRANKEN BERRY!

So for our main event, we have Frank Berry which has an oddly offensive caricature of my son versus Count Chocula which I’m about ninety percent sure is a long lost relative of mine. Let’s dig in!

COUNT CHOCULA: I’m going to take a break from all of the berryism and go straight into the Count Chocula which I’m told is the highest-selling of all the monster cereals. So let’s see what all the fuss is about shall we?

The shapes are pretty much the same as the other two cereals I’ve tasted so far so this appears to be just a consistent design across the line of monster cereals. It’s as if General Mills doesn’t know that MONSTERS CRAVE VARIETY in our cereals… I guess. More marshmallows in this one. There does seem to be a difference in that we have different colors of bats in here, some with swirls.

And now for the big taste test… (crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch…) Wow! (crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch…) It still tastes great even after the other 80 bites. I can see why you spooks and spookettes like this. I think I could eat chocolate every day of my life. I may give up blood. I could eat this every day of my afterlife. What do they call someone who can’t stop eating chocolate? A chocoholic? I am a chocoholic! (crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch…) This CAN’T BE HEALTHY FOR YOU! There’s now way! It’s delightful! It’s everything you dream about! If I could go to Heaven, this is where I’d want to be! (crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch…) ok, that’s enough… one more bite… (crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch…). Maybe I’m a little biased because there’s a vampire on the box but that’s tough to beat!

FRANKEN BERRY: This looks exactly like Frute Brute! Almost the exact same thing. The only difference is the colors of the marshmallows and this appears to have more variety. I have to unleash the palette! Attack! Attack!

Hmmm… (crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch…) This one… tastes… as if Frute Brute was really giving 100 percent. Frute Brute is the slacker college edition of what this cereal needs to be and Franken Berry is it’s full potential. I’m starting to think that Frute Brute was just a scheme to get more money and Chocula, Boo Berry and Franken Berry are the real deal as far as the quality of the cereals. (crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch…) I hope I don’t get canceled for that! (crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch… crunch…) I can see why these two are the main event.

MAIN EVENT DECISION: This one was a little more difficult… but for the main event I have to give it to COUNT CHOCULA!

Simply because this one really stands out amongst the pack! Everything else is just really fruity and berry and nothing beats chocolate! Even from an outsider’s perspective. I don’t see how you can get any better than putting chocolate in a cereal! That stated, I have to give Franken Berry an honorable mention but for this, I’m going to have to stick with my own kind. It’s just delicious how the chocolate mixes with the grains and marshmallow. This is definitely number one! The winner! No compromises!

Still I have to say that Franken Berry and Boo Berry do deserve an honorable mention. I was a little disappointed in Frute Brute simply because there doesn’t seem to be anything different. I wish General Mills would be a little more sensitive to the needs of monsters around the world and maybe have differnt flavors centered around different monsters. Like maybe a caramel-flavored cereal with a Harpie or maybe a ketchup cereal with Jason Vorhees not withstanding copyright laws and all that!

What a fun time I’ve had but now that I think about it… I really wish Yummy Mummy could have been here. But something tells me it’s probably not that much different from Franken Berry.

Now it’s time for me to relenquish the reigns of the Spook Shack and return you to the Dandy Fun House where everything is always FUN AND DANDY!

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Count Drahoon is the host of Count Drahoon’s Feature of Fright podcast bringing you original scary stories in the style of dramatic radio theater! Subscribe and enjoy at http://www.FeatureOfFright.com