Product 19

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Product 19 is a breakfast cereal made by Kellogg's. Introduced in 1967, it consists of lightly sweetened flakes made of corn, oats, wheat, and rice, and has an ever-so-slight sour bite to its taste as well, making it a favorite among many cold-cereal eaters. It is packaged and sold in a red box.

[edit] Name

One might expect that Product 19 is so named because it contains 19 vitamins and minerals. However, as the front of the box indicates, it contains only 12 vitamins and minerals. This raises the question: what is the significance of the number 19?

According to the book Cerealizing America: The Unsweetened Story of Breakfast Cereal by Scott Bruce and Bill Crawford, Kellogg's copywriter John E. Matthews was having difficulty naming the as-yet-unnamed cereal, which was being developed to compete with the General Mills cereal Total. Finally, he settled on the name Product 19, as the cereal was the 19th product that Kellogg's was working on that year.

[edit] Ingredients

Milled Corn, Sugar, Whole Oat Flour, Wheat Flour, Rice, Defatted Wheat Germ, Salt, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Malt Flavoring, Sodium Ascorbate and Ascorbic Acid (Vit C), Alpha Tocopherol Acetate (Vit E), Naicinamide, Zinc Oxide, Annatto Color, Reduced Iron, Calcium Pantothenate, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride (Vit B6), Riboflavin (Vit B2), Thiamin Hydrochloride (Vit B1), BHT (Preservative), Vit A Palmitate, Folic Acid, Vit B12 and Vit D. Contains Wheat Ingredients. Corn Used in This Product Contains Traces of Soybeans.