When exactly does cereal go soggy?
A study of the effects of water content on the compaction behaviour of breakfast cereal flakes
Food physicists squashed cereal flakes at different dampness levels to understand when crunchy turns soggy.
Ig Nobel 1995
The researchers packed cereal flakes into a cylinder, added different amounts of moisture, and measured how the pile crushed down under pressure.
Wetter flakes squashed very differently from dry ones, which matters for packaging and for that crucial bowl-of-milk countdown. Someone had to formalise the soggy cereal problem, and we thank them.
Eat your breakfast quickly. It’s physics.