Dangerous Froot Loops

When I was little, my mother hardly ever bought us sugar cereals. Sure we used to get them on camping trips - sometimes - because of those handy little mini value packs, but if I ever really wanted a hit I had to swindle a bowl of Count Chocula or Trix from my friends.

Now as you all know, I get the Canadian Food Inspection Agency email alerts for undeclared allergies, toxins etc found in Canadian food. Anyways. Today there was an alert about a happy sugar cereal: Kellogg’s Holiday Froot Loops (why the bad spelling of fruit? why? does bad spelling just appeal more to children?).

It seems that our poor Kellogg’s has accidentally added some milk proteins to the cereal and omitted including this fact in their ingredient list. Which is somewhat ironic (and I admit made me laugh) because I’d say about 99% of people eating Froot Loops will add milk to their cereal anyways.

Now I realize, as an allergy sufferer myself, that this really isn’t a laughing matter. People could get very sick, even go into anaphylactic shock from eating a tainted Loop. But for me at least, it would be sort of like getting an alert that read: WARNING. UNDECLARED ALMONDS HAZELNUTS AND WALNUTS IN SKIPPY PEANUT BUTTER. Funny for me (as I am allergic to all of them), but it would send my brother (who is not allergic to peanuts, but allergic to the other tree nuts) to the hospital within minutes (not least because he eats peanut butter by the jar full).

So, er, what’s the moral of the story? Sign up for the CFIA Hazard Alerts or FDA notifications or whatever your country has to offer. Guaranteed to be life-saving or purely entertaining! Straight to your inbox!