Kellogs Corn Flakes

We have global markets and yet we have insular standards.

In the UK breakfast cereals are the most popular breakfast per head per capita in the world and yet Kellogs who are the biggest breakfast cereal manufacturer add malt to an otherwise gf cereal. Kellogs do not use barley malt in all countries. In Taiwan they have a factory and they use rice malt and in Switzerland they have very strict additive laws and I understand they do not add malt there. I have contacted Kellogs and asked them to import gf cornflakes for coeliac and their response was that CUK classed crunchy nut cornflakes etc as gf so there was not a need. This changed late in 2007 when the labelling laws changed and they had to put contains barley malt on the packaging.

So what happens now? coeliac either buy expensive organic free from cornflakes or malted own brand supermarket ones and why? Why can't Kellogs import them for us?

This is where coeliac societies could really motivate their members to lobby Kellogs on mass with friends and family threatening to boycot their goods. They lobby parlamnet for food on script so why not food manufacturers?

In Bristol there were over 1500 coeliac 10 years ago where as GFG has about 100 so they have the contact details needed to motivate ALL UK coeliac.

So every so often I bring this up and hope that others will want change and access to global goods. Kellogs won't listen to me but if one in a hundred of diagnosed coeliac contacted them they might sit up and listen so awareness of what is available to other coeliac is imperative.

I don't eat breakfast cereals but can see the advantages to others and they sell rice crispie/ cornflake choc bars and if these were malt free they could be totally GF and could be a nice gf snack when out and about.

Food for thought.

Jerry

[petraaitken]

Great article Jerry. I totally agree - I cannot justify buying cornflakes when I have to pay so much for them. In NZ the run of the mill cornflakes are gluten free yet here in Australia they are not.

It would be great to petition Kellogs to look at making their range gluten free....

[philaustin]

"The accidental legacy of corn flakes goes back to the late 19th century, when a team of Seventh-day Adventists began to develop new food to adhere to the vegetarian diet recommended by the church. Members of the group experimented with a number of different grains, including wheat, oats, rice, barley, and corn. In 1894, Dr. John Harvey Kellogg, the superintendent of The Battle Creek Sanitarium in Michigan and an Adventist, used these recipes as part of a strict vegetarian regimen for his patients, which also included no alcohol, tobacco, or caffeine. The diet he imposed consisted entirely of bland foods. A follower of Sylvester Graham, the inventor of graham crackers and graham bread and supporter of sexual abstinence, Kellogg believed that spicy or sweet foods would increase passions. In contrast, cornflakes would have an anaphrodisiac property and lower the sex drive."

(from Wikipaedia).

Do you still want to eat Kellog's breakfast cereals?

I much prefer to have oats for breakfast!

[Moon]

I recommend the movie about Dr Kellogg; "The Road to Wellville", starring John Cusack and Anthony Hopkins as the controversial doctor and inventor (of not just the breakfast cereal but the peanut butter, electric blanket and much more)

It's a great film.