As I walk through the cereal aisle in a supermarket here in Tübingen, I’m struck by how the shelves are filled with all shapes and sizes of packages containing the German breakfast cereal of choice: Müsli. While there is an American breakfast cereal called Mueslix that is the same idea as the German food, Müsli is a generic term in German that refers to a combination of uncooked rolled oats, fruits and nuts, and multiple variations on that theme (e.g. without dried fruits, without nuts, with additional grains, etc. etc.)

It’s considered a healthy breakfast food, and when paired with yogurt, it is how many, if not most, Germans “break their fast” and start their day.

Well, they also eat ham sandwiches and whole-grain bread for breakfast, too, and a proper German kitchen isn’t full-equipped unless it has an electric soft-boiled egg maker in which to make the morning 3-minute egg. But I digress – a discussion of those foods will have to wait until another day.

Now, in that grocery store cereal aisle, a bit less than a quarter of the space is taken up with American boxed cereals, including many of the best-known American brands that you’d find in the U.S.

Except, there are two things you need to know. Cornflakes is used in German to refer to all of those American cereals. In fact, Cornflakes means “cereal” in German. Seriously. My folk etymology to explain this would predict that Kellog’s Cornflakes was the first-ever American boxed cereal sold in Germany, and then the name of that one cereal just got generalized to refer to all American cereals … and then by extension to any boxed cereal food.

Someone, maybe Chris, once commented that we’ll know we’re fluent in German when we can say we eat Cornflakes for breakfast and not feel we’re answering the question of which specific cold cereal we eat. In my class last year, I would have very hard time processing the sentence when anyone told me that they ate Cornflakes for breakfast … and then went on to explain they liked Frosted Flakes, for example.

The other thing that we’ve have speculated about is that most all of the Cornflakes versions they have here seem to be aimed only at kids. I.e. they mostly have just the sweetened varieties of stuff that I’m assuming is still offered in alternate, unsweetened forms in the U.S.  For example,  they do still make the unsweetened version of Rice Krispies, right? Here, the only thing I’ve seen is Coco-Krispies.

Now, even though people in Italy don’t tend to eat cereal for breakfast — the typical breakfast there is a croissant-like brioche —  there were many more non-sweetened American cereal choices to be had in Bolzano than there are here. For example, in Italy, we always bought Cheerios, which to our surprise aren’t even sold here in Germany. Which isn’t the end of the world, of course,  just an unexpected difference.

Anyway, I guess the adults here prefer their German Müsli, while perhaps there’s advertising for all the sweetened American cereals that are aimed at the German kids. Since the one American food custom we have retained through all the places we’ve lived is having a breakfast of cold cereal and milk, we have tried to adapt to eating the German Müsli for our breakfast, without success.  It’s just too healthy-tasting, I guess. 😉

So, we’re making our way through the limited Cornflakes (American cereal) selections, searching for something that’s unsweetened. However, the Special-K and the  Cornflakes – Das Original! American cereals have something added that seems different from the unsweetened versions in the U.S. – I guess they are aimed at the kids market, too. As I mentioned, perhaps real adults eat Müsli.  After a year, we still haven’t completely settled on a regular breakfast food. Indeed, after experimenting this past month with yet another type of Müsli,  I’ve switched back to Special-K for my morning Cornflakes.

Nope, not fluent yet. That still just sounds odd.

*****

Thanks to Chris, we can end on a musical note today. Here’s a link to Punky’s Dilemma, a song by Paul Simon. If you’re not familiar with the song (like I wasn’t), here’s the opening lyric:

Wish I was a Kellogg’s Cornflake
Floatin’ in my bowl takin’ movies, …