By Jon Brooks
At the intersection of the Halloween season and classic breakfast cereals sits the General Mills Monster Cereals.
Spooky cereals like Count Chocula, Franken Berry, and Boo Berry were first released in the early 1970s. According to the General Mills website, these cereals used to be sold year round (up until 2009), but these days they are sold in stores for a limited time leading up to the Oct. 31 holiday each year.
Franken Berry is one of my all-time favorite breakfast cereals. I was a kid who preferred strawberry milk to chocolate milk (on the rare occasion you could find it). My mom used to make a topping for waffles called “strawberry butter” that I preferred to maple syrup (if I recall correctly, it was made mixing frozen strawberries with a stick of butter in the blender).
Bridget got me all three available Monster Cereals to review on the blog this year.
I’ve had Franken Berry and Count Chocula (both introduced in 1971) numerous times over the years, but I’ve never had Boo Berry (introduced in 1972) before.
I don’t know why I hadn’t tried that particular flavor. I love blueberries.
A woman working at the Dairy Queen on north 72nd Street in Omaha once chastised me for ordering blueberries on a sundae.
“Blueberries? Nobody likes blueberries,” she chided — look lady, if it’s on your menu someone might to order it! (Unfortunately, they were out of blueberries that particular day... I wonder why? 😉)
Anyhow, I was excited to try Boo Berry for the first time. It features crunchy blue cereal pieces and marshmallows and (in my opinion) tastes pretty similar to Franken Berry, which was fine by me.
In addition to the three Monster Cereals mentioned, General Mills also has Frute Brute (introduced in 1974) and Fruity Yummy Mummy (introduced in 1992). Those two cereals returned briefly in 2013, and it was the only time that all five Monster Cereals were available to purchase at the same time.
In 2023, General Mills introduced Carmella Creeper, which they suggest tastes like caramel apples (and according to cereal lore she is Franken Berry’s cousin).
Sadly, only the first three Monster Cereal icons made a return this year.
General Mills collaborated with Jim Henson’s Creature Shop for the 2025 and 2026 boxes. The artwork features images of the spooky cereal creatures as fully-imagined Muppets.
They also offered limited edition boxes that feature a “fuzzy texture” on some of the characters. (I haven’t seen those at the grocery story, but will be on the lookout in the future.)
The standard boxes feature a hand puppet that you can cut out and assemble. I haven’t made my hand puppets yet since I’m still eating the three cereals.
I hope that some of the more obscure monsters make a return appearance soon. In particular, I’d like to try Fruit Brute sometime (I’m bummed out that I missed its re-release in 2013).
A Fruit Brute cereal box was featured in the 1994 film “Pulp Fiction,” and the character Lance (Eric Stoltz) is seen eating a bowl of it. The cereal was officially retired in 1982 — long before “Pulp Fiction” was filmed.
The box is part of writer/director Quentin Tarantino’s personal collection. The Fruit Brute box also made an appearance in Tarantino’s first film “Reservoir Dogs.”
Overall, I love the General Mills Monster Cereals. Crunchy pieces that taste like chocolate, strawberries, and blueberries (respectively) are right up my alley. And who doesn’t love breakfast cereal marshmallows?
Bridget has ordered bags of “just” the marshmallows from Lucky Charms before… yes, you can do that!
When I was a kid it was a treat to get cereals like Lucky Charms and Fruity Pebbles. We mostly had the healthier, whole-grain cereal varieties on hand.
There is something fun about opening up a box of sugary goodness… and General Mills Monster Cereals are among the best!
>> If you enjoyed my review of the General Mills Monster Cereals, consider following me on Twitter/X for more great content — @thejoncrunch
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