Last week I received a free sample of new Kellogg’s All-Bran Golden Crunch – in quite an innovative way, as it happens. One evening a paper bag came though my letterbox inviting me to leave it outside my front door by 9 am the next morning if I wanted to receive a full-size box of said new cereal. If? I’ve lived in Yorkshire far too long now to turn down anything that’s free! So on the doormat it went, and the Golden Crunch was duly delivered. Now then Kelloggs, if you leave something that purports to be healthy on the doorstep of a wellness coach, it’s gonna get tasted and rated! So purely in the interests of research I had it for breakfast.
My initial thought was that calling this stuff All-Bran anything is a bit misleading, as according the packet it’s only 26% wheat bran – a mere bagatelle compared to the old-school, hardcore stuff your grandparents used to eat. But maybe Kelloggs think that younger, 21st century consumers are made of feebler stuff and would no more consider eating ‘proper’ All-Bran than walking to the shops. It would have been much more honest just to label it as Golden Crunch and not try to make people think it’s as good for you as the real thing. So what’s the rest of it made up of? Well, it’s also 18% rice flour (not exactly high fibre) and the third ingredient on the list is (surprise, surprise) sugar – at a whopping 21%! Not exactly health food then. The wording on the back of the packet is very carefully composed, saying Golden Crunch is ‘good for your digestive health’ – i.e. not your health in general. But really, if digestive health is your prime concern you could do a lot better than this to help it. I get the impression Kellogg’s have just jumped on the ‘digestive health’ bandwagon, afraid that people who worry about such things will all start eating Activia for brekkie instead of cereal. So my advice is, if you want to eat something high in fibre for breakfast, choose something without masses of added sugar like original All Bran, Bran Flakes, Shredded Wheat, porridge or muesli instead, preferably with with some fresh fruit.
I think it would have been a much more worthwhile exercise if Kellogg’s had repositioned the All-Bran brand to appeal to today’s health-conscious consumers, so that they no longer associated it with pensioners, prunes and powdered egg, but saw it as a positive contribution to their regular diet; because proper All-Bran does have some real nutritional value. Having said all that, I can’t deny that Golden Crunch does taste nice – well how could it not when it’s nearly a quarter sugar? It’s a bit like crunchy biscuits really, and in our house people keep grabbing handfuls from the packet to eat it just as a snack, much as you would a biccie. But really, if you’re reading this would you consider having a bowl of biscuits to set you up for the day? Hopefully not! So my verdict is… delicious, yes – healthy, no. But thanks for the freebie Mr Kellogg!
