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The Cinnamon Toast Crunch shrimp memes are great, even if the viral photos were gross

Funny. Gross. All you could want.

Tim Marcin

on March 23, 2021

Try as you might, it's tough to conjure a more gross food combo than shrimp and Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Nobody in their right mind would want to eat that.

But that's allegedly what one person claims they found as an unwelcome surprise with their breakfast.

Jensen Karp, a writer/comedian/former rapper/art gallery owner/producer, — and, sure, why not, also the husband of Danielle Fishel aka Topanga from Boy Meets World — tweeted a photo of strange surprise in his cereal. It has since become a Whole Thing. Here's how it started.

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Karp Tweeted the photo on Monday afternoon, and Cinnamon Toast Crunch eventually responded, saying that the objects in the cereal was just accumulated sugar. Karp, and lots of other folks, were simply not buying. Things only got more strange from there. Karp appeared to find string, other materials, a re-taped bag, and little black marks on the cereal itself. Some folks wondered — gulp — if rats had nested in the box and those specks were...well...you know, poop. To top it off, Karp claims he had eaten a bowl before finding these disturbing cereal additions.

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After some frustration with General Mills, the cereal company that makes Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Karp has set out to get the apparent shrimp tails and cereal tested. You can find the full story thus far on his timeline and it is wild. General Mills, meanwhile, has claimed the issue didn't originate with their facility.

"While we are still investigating this matter, we can say with confidence that this did not occur at our facility," said Mike Siemienas, a spokesperson for General Mills, in a statement emailed to Mashable. "We are waiting for the consumer to send us the package to investigate further. Any consumers who notice their cereal box or bag has been tampered with, such as the clear tape that was found in this case, should contact us."

While the world waits for answers — none of which seem all that pleasant — at least we have memes. And the memes about shrimp cereal have been good.

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Listen, is shrimp and maybe rat droppings in cereal gross? You bet. But at least we got some good memes.

Tim Marcin

Associate Editor, Culture

Tim Marcin is an Associate Editor on the culture team at Mashable, where he mostly digs into the weird parts of the internet. You'll also see some coverage of memes, tech, sports, trends, and the occasional hot take. You can find him on Bluesky (sometimes), Instagram (infrequently), or eating Buffalo wings (as often as possible).