Of all things the pandemic has taken away, which do you miss most?
Large family gatherings? Concerts? Weddings? International travel? Grape-Nuts?
Wait a minute. Grape-Nuts?
That’s right. Grape-Nuts, that hard breakfast cereal that includes neither grapes or nuts, has been in short supply for the better part of the past year, and Post Consumer Brands blames it on the coronavirus pandemic.
Who knew?
Grape-Nuts has been on our personal grocery list for well over a month now, and admittedly it seemed rather odd that week after week the shelf at our store had been bare. It seemed especially odd because I always assumed that anyone who regularly placed this product into a grocery cart was in pretty limited company.
Most of us know Grape-Nuts as a rather tasteless concoction of wheat and barley that is processed in a way that makes little nougats so hard that you’d swear they’d break off pieces of your bicuspids.
Frankly, we don’t buy them a lot, and when we do a box can last for a couple of months. But when you can’t get ‘em, you want ‘em. And so it is that Grape- Nuts has been transferred from one shopping list to another to another.
We have a granddaughter who thinks they’re a treat, and I like to occasionally mix them with one of the flakes cereals to provide a little extra crunch. For some completely unexplainable and irrational reason, I also like to indulge in a few spoonfuls on those rare occasions when something wakes me up in the middle of the night and I have trouble nodding off again.
Once in awhile we also sprinkle them atop a green salad to provide a little snap, crackle and pop.
I had an uncle who ate Grape- Nuts regularly. His habit was to get up an hour before breakfast, pour a bowlful, fill it with milk, and then go back to sleep while his cereal softened.
Still, I subconsciously assumed that the only folks who ate this cereal were nuts like us.
Then the pandemic hit, and almost immediately people from sea to shining sea were taking their breakfast – not to mention most other meals – at home.
As they stocked their pantries for breakfast at the kitchen table, Grape-Nuts were flying off the shelves faster than you can say “I’m out of toilet paper.”
Post was unprepared for this run on its 124-year-old cereal. Complicating matters, the company reported last year that supply chain disruptions were making it difficult to ramp up production to meet the new-found demand.
Eventually, the issues were resolved and Post announced it would soon be producing enough to fill store shelves from Oregon to Florida.
True to form, that’s about when I first learned of this Grape- Nuts caper. I usually find out about trends when they’re about over, though the shelf at our goto store remains bare.
In the meantime, believe it or not, a sort of black market developed. If you could find it, cereal that normally retailed for $4.99 a box was selling for as much as $50. On Walmart.com, a third-party seller listed a 4-pound box for $110, according to USA Today, which also found Amazon and eBay listings with hiked-up prices.
Post announced awhile back that by mid March, Grape-Nuts should once again be available everywhere, providing hope that they’ll be back in our pantry in a couple weeks.
Close call for Medora
A wildfire came within an eyelash of unleashing devastation in the iconic Badlands community. In its wake, folks from the Badlands to the Red River Valley are talking about how the fire season, which came about a month earlier than normal, could potentially be the worst ever in North Dakota.
Dry grass and brush and high winds make the state a tinderbox, and that’s bad news.
Worse, though, is the outlook for agriculture.
With extreme drought conditions covering 40 percent of the state and severe drought conditions covering most of the rest, crop and livestock production could be considerable more problematic than fires.
As wind gusts reached past 50 mph last week, a neighbor proclaimed that in North Dakota the wind machine never turns off.
Which means we all need to start praying to the rain gods.
The Link LonkApril 07, 2021 at 03:42AM
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Grape-Nuts makes pandemic casualty list - Journaltrib
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