Kim Severson

The people behind cereal, we might want to ask why we are just following them blindly, but I'll come back to that in a second.

This article is from the New York Times by Kim Severson.

It's called Cereals in a Crunch.

Can a health pitch save it? It's really good.

Check it out.

Here is what I learned from Kim Severson about cereal and the man who created graham crackers.

Breakfast cereal, as we know, was created in 1863 by Dr. James Caleb Jackson, a physician in a Western New York sanitarium.

His recipe was a dried mix of water and a coarse whole wheat flour championed by Sylvester Graham, an eccentric health-obsessed Presbyterian minister who invented the graham cracker.

It's weathered worse.

And this was a piece written by Kim Severson, who I think is maybe in Atlanta.

She did the very New York Times thing, which is just like great write-up of the kind of history of the design of the Cheesecake Factory, etc.

And then she goes, on a recent visit to an Atlanta location, the employees, you know, it's like where the reporter has to leave themselves out of the experience.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So like the chains again, I'm reading from this Kim Severson piece in The Times.

The chains look dreamed up by its founder and chief executive, David Overton, and refined over 16 years by Mr. McCormack.

And so today, we're checking in on the state of Halloween in 2026.

First, the Times' food writer, Kim Severson, will lead me on a culinary journey through the latest and greatest in the world of candy.

Then Louis Lucero II, an editor on our styles desk, will give us a rundown of the most distinctly 2026 costumes to look for on Halloween night.

And finally, our reporter Callie Holtermann and I will talk about Halloween decorations and why Americans spend billions of dollars on them.

It's Sunday, Shocktober.

I mean, October 25th.

Kim Severson, what a pleasure to have you back on the show here on the Sunday Daily.

Thanks so much, Rachel.

It's great that sugar is suspicious.

There's a terrific new book that was the basis of this Kim Severson New York Times piece by our favorite Marion Nestle, Nutrition Authority, with a longtime Kellogg's executive named Lisa Sutherland, who's a nutritionist.

And what it is, is it's a tracing of the history of breakfast cereals as the vehicle for every fad there is to market food.

over the decades.

You know, I don't know if you knew this before.

I had no idea.

Isn't this Kim Severson is how you say your buddy's name? Yeah.

Severson and the New York Times.

Hold on, one last-

Kim, call Kim

... one, one last thing.

Please.

One last thing.

It, it-

Call Kim Severson, fast as thing

... okay.

I do too.

Kim Severson, who's in Atlanta, also travels a lot.

Priya Krishna travels.

So I think we just try to be aware and pay attention to those places.