The Hilarious Reason Smurf Berry Crunch Cereal Was Discontinued
Breakfast has always been the most important meal of the day, and what better way to start the day off with a big bowl of cereal? Sure, that bowl of Trix or Fruity Pebbles may be a pretty sweet way to start the day, but super sugary breakfast cereals have been around for quite some time.
To be sure, this doesn't mean that it's unrealistic for people to have concerns about them. Action on Sugar, for example, reports that 92% of children's breakfast cereals contain medium to high amounts of sugar. But to say that sugary cereals haven't existed for decades would be outright false. Indeed, one such product that served kids for years is Smurf Berry Crunch.
"The Smurfs" was a cartoon in the 1980s that followed a group of little blue creatures called Smurfs, who lived in the forest and battled an evil wizard called Gargamel. The show, which was based on a Belgian comic by Pierre Culliford from the 1950s (via AP News), was popular enough to become a cereal. It was appropriately titled Smurf Berry Crunch.
However, there's a reason why Smurf Berry Crunch isn't available on your local grocery store shelves anymore, even if the reason is potentially too weird to believe.
Smurf Berry Crunch supposedly had an embarrassing side effect
According to some sources, Smurf Berry Crunch had the unintended side effect of turning one's fecal matter a dark blue color, the same color as the cereal's titular Smurf creatures, which is why it inevitably left store shelves.
According to Commonplace Facts, Smurf Berry Crunch had this unusual side effect because of the blue dye in the cereal. Blue dyes are used for everything from cereals to blue jeans, so they're potent, to say the least (via Scientific American). When people started hearing their kids were talking about what color their fecal matter was, there was obviously some pushback. From there, Post Cereals tweaked the formula for the cereal, re-releasing it as Smurf Magic Berries in 1987, before that too fizzled out in Saturday morning history. As far as we know, no medical papers have been published decrying the gastrointestinal effects of Smurf Berry Crunch on the human body.
Strangely, this isn't the first time a cereal caused such an unnatural side effect. According to Smithsonian Magazine, Frankenberry — the strawberry-flavored cereal that comes around every Halloween with Count Chocula and Boo-Berry — was infamous for supposedly turning fecal matter a bright pinkish-red color akin to "strawberry ice cream." The cause for the "Franken Berry Stool," as it was dubbed, was later revealed to be due to food dyes in the cereal.