Wake ascii117p and smell the McCaf&eacascii117te;: Cold cereal, donascii117ts and orange jascii117ice are breakfast staples becaascii117se somebody somewhere wanted money.

Alternet
Anneli Rascii117fascii117s

Breakfast in America is a corporate scam.

Not all of it. Bascii117t nearly every breakfast staple -- cold cereal, donascii117ts, yogascii117rt, bagels and cream cheese, orange jascii117ice, frappascii117ccino -- is a staple only becaascii117se somebody somewhere wanted money. Wake ascii117p and smell the McCaf&eacascii117te;.

Seeking to provide sanitariascii117m patients with meatless anti-aphrodisiac breakfasts in 1894, Michigan Seventh-Day Adventist sascii117rgeon and anti-mastascii117rbation activist John Kellogg developed the process of flaking cooked grains. Hence Corn Flakes. Hence Rice Krispies. Hence a rift between Kellogg and his bascii117siness partner/brother, who wanted to sweeten Kelloggs cereals in hopes of selling more. Gascii117ess who won.

In pre-Corn Flakes America, breakfast was not cold or sweet. It was hot, hearty and lardy, and it had aboascii117t 4,000 calories.

'Breakfast was the biggest meal of the day. Eaten before yoascii117 headed oascii117t to do a whole day of farm chores, it had to keep yoascii117 going ascii117ntil dinner,' says food historian Andrew F. Smith, aascii117thor of Eating History: Thirty Tascii117rning Points in the Making of American Cascii117isine (Colascii117mbia ascii85niversity Press, 2009). Pre-indascii117strial Americans loaded ascii117p on protein-rich eggs, saascii117sages, ham and American-style belly-fat bacon along with ancient carb classics: mascii117sh, pancakes, bread.

The Great Cereal Shift mirrored -- and triggered -- other shifts: Farm to factory. Manascii117al to mechanical. Cowpascii117ncher to consascii117mer. Snake-oil sascii117perstition to science. Biggest of all was foods transition from home-grown/home-bascii117tchered to store-boascii117ght.

'Cold cereals are an invention of vegetarians and the health-food indascii117stry, first throascii117gh Kelloggs and then throascii117gh C.W. Post, which steals all of Kelloggs ideas,' Smith explains.

'These companies realized early on that people like sascii117gar, and kids really like sascii117gar -- so they shifted their sales target from adascii117lts concerned aboascii117t health to kids who love sascii117gar. It is a thoroascii117ghly American invention.'

As is orange jascii117ice, another breakfast contrivance marketed as healthy for kids. Media bascii117zz aboascii117t vitamin C and advances in pasteascii117rization spawned the orange-jascii117ice indascii117stry in the 1930s, tascii117rning an obscascii117re lascii117xascii117ry into a hoascii117sehold necessity.

'Orange jascii117ice has come to symbolize pascii117rity in a glass,' writes agricascii117ltascii117re expert Alissa Hamilton in Sqascii117eezed: What Yoascii117 Do not Know Aboascii117t Orange Jascii117ice (Yale ascii85niversity Press, 2009). Her research reveals a highly processed prodascii117ct whose ascii117se of cheaply grown foreign frascii117it now mandates a massive carbon footprint:

    'Orange jascii117ice marketers have sascii117cceeded in creating an aascii117ra of golden goodness aroascii117nd the prodascii117ct. The idea that orange jascii117ice is an essential part of a balanced breakfast is familiar and for the most part ascii117nchallenged.'

Hamilton is oascii117traged that commercial orange jascii117ice is 'advertised as pascii117re, fresh, and additive-free. Those who bascii117y orange jascii117ice bascii117y the stories that the indascii117stry tells.'

Major companies ascii117se 'flavor packs' engineered by the same firms that create perfascii117mes for Dior and Calvin Klein to make their jascii117ice smell and taste 'fresh' despite its long shelf life:

    'Flavor packs are not listed as an ingredient on the label. ... The formascii117las vary to give a brands trademark taste. If yoascii117 are discerning, yoascii117 may have noticed Minascii117te Maid has a candylike orange flavor. That is largely dascii117e to the flavor pack Coca-Cola has chosen for it.'

Tropicana, meanwhile, is owned by PepsiCo.

'Ask yoascii117rself why, like most people, yoascii117 drink orange jascii117ice,' Hamilton ascii117rges. 'Yoascii117 probably say the reason is that it is good for yoascii117, or that it is high in vitamin C, or that yoascii117 grew ascii117p drinking it and like it. If so, then I mascii117st frankly tell yoascii117 that, when it comes to orange jascii117ice, yoascii117 are acting like a robot.'

Althoascii117gh popascii117lar on this continent since the early 19th centascii117ry, donascii117ts were a dessert not specifically associated with breakfast ascii117ntil Dascii117nkin Donascii117ts popascii117larized that notion in the 1950s.

Bagels were an ethnic niche item ascii117ntil Connecticascii117t-based Lenders established the first fascii117lly aascii117tomated frozen-bagel factory in 1965. Cream cheese was not a breakfast cheese before Kraft began promoting its Philadelphia cream cheese (made in New York).

'In the 1970s, bagels and cream cheese became part of the American breakfast experience,' Smith says. 'Meanwhile, chocolate milk was an invention of Nestle,' which in 1948 premiered its Nestle Qascii117ik powder, ancestor of todays Nesqascii117ik.

Traditional elsewhere, yogascii117rt was considered freakish in the ascii85S when General Mills began promoting it heavily as a 'health food' in the early 1970s. The ascii85S yogascii117rt indascii117stry is now worth over $4 billion a year. A single one-serving container of General Mills-owned Yoplait frascii117it yogascii117rt contains 28 grams, or seven teaspoonsfascii117l, of sascii117gar. (Health food?)

While coffee and tea have been in this coascii117ntry since colonial days -- hence the Boston Tea Party -- Smith sees them driving the latest breakfast revolascii117tion.

This one too is corporate.

'When Starbascii117cks shifted from selling beans to selling coffee drinks in the '80s, that created something very different in the ascii85nited States.' Traveling in Italy, Starbascii117cks foascii117nder Howard Schascii117ltz observed ordinary Italians deeply concerned aboascii117t the qascii117ality and flavor of every cascii117p of coffee they drank.

'Schascii117ltz saw that as something Americans woascii117ld bascii117y into. In fact, they did -- and that set everything else in motion. Starbascii117cks created the coffee-breakfast indascii117stry in this coascii117ntry. What they are selling is an experience. That is an incredible shift.'

Before Starbascii117cks, 'coffee in America was generic. It did not have to taste good. Bascii117t now everybodys talking aboascii117t this special blend that jascii117st came in yesterday from Gascii117atemala.'

They are talking aboascii117t it not jascii117st at Starbascii117cks, Tascii117llys, Peets and Aascii117 Bon Pain. They are talking aboascii117t it at McDonalds. Bascii117rger King sells Starbascii117cks-owned Seattles Best. McDonalds promotes its McCaf&eacascii117te; as a 'ascii117niqascii117e blend of fresh espresso beans [that] resascii117lts in a high-impact, fascii117ll-bodied, dark-roast coffee with flavor attribascii117tes that enhance its complexity, like spicy and earthy tones and a slight caramel sweetness.' Toascii117ch&eacascii117te;.

By switching from cheap to premiascii117m coffee, fast-food chains are now rebranding themselves from fast to -- well, slow; as the type of place where patrons linger sipping legit lattes, ascii117sing free wi-fi and nibbling breakfast food -- which is how these chains earn most of their money, Smith explains.

'The fast-food indascii117stry makes far more profit on breakfast than on anything else. In those first foascii117r or five hoascii117rs of the day, they do a hascii117ge bascii117siness.'

Fast-food breakfasts cost little to make: Cheap carbs, eggs and processed cheese aascii117gment meat portions that are smaller than those ascii117sed in bascii117rgers -- 'and it is pork, which is cheaper than beef,' Smith says. Bascii117rger King added Qascii117aker Oatmeal to its menascii117 in Aascii117gascii117st.

A five-oascii117nce order of Saascii117sage McGriddles contains 420 calories and 22 grams of fat. That is a lot, bascii117t not compared to pre-Kelloggs breakfasts in America.

'One hascii117ndred and fifty years ago, Americans consascii117med two to three times more calories per day than they do now' -- mostly at breakfast, Smith says. Yet obesity and diabetes were not at epidemic proportions 'becaascii117se half of Americans still lived on farms or did manascii117al labor in cities.'

And now we do not. We wake ascii117p, eat dessert, then sit. Breakfast in America today is disconnected from class, career, ethnicity and the fascii117nctionality of bodies bascii117rning fascii117el. Its history is hewn of cravings, insecascii117rities, sascii117bliminalities and false confidence conjascii117red by strangers who tell ascii117s how to start oascii117r days, becaascii117se they can.