What Happened to Muesli?

 I don’t normally eat muesli for every breakfast, but I like a change, and I thought I would get some. 

There are things that are so emblematic of the capitalist system that we live in that it is even quite comforting, in a way. 

For a Saturday, the shop seemed strangely empty, maybe it was the inflation. Anyway, every brand of muesli (or ‘muesli), of about six or seven, including even Jordans, had chocolate chips in them, and all of them were some abomination called (here in France) ‘croustillant’, which apparently means they wrap blobs of oat flakes in caramelized sugar, so they end up like little flapjacks I guess. I quite like flapjacks, but If I want one, I will get one, or make one, given I have never seen one for sale in France.

- Now, I do not like sugary things, and do not eat chocolate all that much and do not want it in my breakfast cereal, but there seemed to be no choice. I went for the only one that had no chocolate in it, it was a ‘bio’ product and looked sober. I did not read the packet that closely and was, the next morning, disappointed to find it was also ‘croustillant’. It also had very few nuts or seeds in it than these gummed up oats and was much too sweet for me. The nuts that were in it were like concrete. If I had gone to the smaller ‘bio’ supermarket I think I could have got some actual ordinary muesli out of the VRAC (the hopper things), but that was out of the way and a bit of a pain, and the staff were often snobby, and your bank balance much worse off afterwards if you ever wandered off-piste.

So, yes, it is sort of comforting, I’m in this familiar setting, just that, I suppose, inflation has just affected things in a slightly more extreme capitalist way, - even humble muesli. I cannot be bothered to work out why. Someone please tell me. Perhaps they can save on the dried fruit and nuts and seeds and just use cheap oats, maybe they get the sugar cheap, and the chocolate, and maybe because the sugariness is kind of addictive they can sell more of it, obviously they are all copying each other in the competition, which is supposed to produce democratic variety but does not. It is probably a form of shrinkflation but instead of shrinking the size they shrink the quality. It can’t be great for your teeth, for kids especially, and isn’t it fattening? One reason I started eating muesli was for its extolled health benefits, a source of fibre, and I like nuts and seeds, and you used to be able to get no added sugar. The original brand was Alpen, which was very good, but I can’t find this in France. Jordans used to be a second choice. But all this health emphasis is evidently out the window now.

If I complained I know what they will say, “it’s the market, people want it”.