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Hi, I'm Darryll and I live in Pullman, Washington with my wife and two kids. I'm a licensed Architect and am employed as a Project Manager at Washington State University. In addition, I have my own business doing residential designs in the greater Palouse area. I am a self-taught pianist, song-writer and singer and am involved in the music department at my local church.

Monday, April 18, 2011

Poor Man's Pop Tarts

I finally found some information on what I thought I remembered... but I just couldn't remember exactly what they were called.  When we were kids, our mom had a tight grocery budget.  This was before the generic brand episode of grocery lore, but our family had a lot of the store brands.

Kellogg's Pop Tarts were what the other more well-off families had.  We had Post Toastem's.  They were good, they weren't Kellogg's but they were good.  There were a lot of different fruit flavored and frosting covered pastries, but the ones that were so cool that we loved - that we just had to have - were the Post Toastem Animals.

There were Munch-a-Berry Monkees, Tuti-Fruiti Owls, Peanut Butter Buffaloes, Berry Bears, Chocolate Flavored Elephants and Cinnamon Lions.  My brother and I both had our favorites - mine were the chocolate flavored Elephants, his were the Peanut Butter Buffaloes,  .  What was really cool was how the animals were on the pastries.  They were kind of "stitched" onto the front of the pastries, so we always ate around the stitching and had the shape of the animal left to eat last.  You got cool stickers that glowed in the dark, too!




Here's a commercial from the '70s for them...notice how the hunter looks like Cap'n Crunch's  brother... (can't figure out how to re-size this... :(






13 comments:

MrsBlogAlot said...

I totally thought that was Captain Crunch!!!

But maybe that's because I've been eating way to much Sugar Pops lately (-:

Blast from the Past said...

No - I think you're right Mrsbloagalot! I'll betcha that times were tough, and Cap'n Crunch was moonlighting as the hunter to pay the bills!

Used that fake English accent and all... pretty clever! :) Wonder if the studios ever caught on...?

joe said...

Mom wouldn't buy Pop Tarts. She thought they were gross. As a mom, she was pretty great, but not as great as she could've been.
Just sayin'

Blast from the Past said...

...even the chocolate pop tarts were gross?!?

Mooo-ooom!

joe said...

Yes, there were times where that woman was just totally unreasonable.
Like when she made me wear this hideous leisure suit I'm sporting here in my profile pic..

Ally said...

That's awesome. Hey it coulda been worse, could have been no frills brand. Remember the black and white brand of chips, fruit punch and lemonade mix, etc. That was before the "store brand."

Blast from the Past said...

Yeah - we used to call it "generic brand". Talk about impersonal! Kind of was leading us down that 1984 Orwellian path back then. Thank goodness didn't keep going down that path as a society. I'd hate to drive a big white generic sedan that says "CAR" on the side of it! :)

LaraAnn said...

My brother and I did love the Pop Tarts when we were kids. I don't remember the brand that you had, it does sound good though- especially the peanut butter. I don't think that Pop Tarts have this. I used to think of some flavors that I wish that they had and that was one of them as well as PB and jelly, lemon, peach and a few others. Now you've got me craving a Chocolate one.

Blast from the Past said...

Dang it, LaraAnn - no you have ME craving a Kelloggs chocolate frosted pop tart. Eat all the edges off first and then enjoy the whole chocolaty frosted center...

maybe I'll have to pick some up on the way home today! :)

Suze said...

OMG! I loved this post! Great title. :)

Blast from the Past said...

Thanks, Suze! Celebrat the memories with a box of chocolate Pop Tarts! :)

Anonymous said...

I knew this existed! However, this is the first confirmation I have found after years of periodically searching for it. I would take on Chocolate Elephant and one Peanut Butter Buffalo and eat them together.

Blast from the Past said...

I'm so glad that you enjoyed the post... As a self-confessed Reeses Peanut Butter Cups addict, I can't believe I haven't ever thought of combining these before! I know now that if I ever do come across Post Tostems again, I wil DEFINITELY be doing this. Im the meantime, I'll just keep scarfing dwon the Reeses! :)