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There are many vegan cereals, but is Cap’n Crunch one of them? The answer isn’t a simple yes or no, because it depends on how strict of a vegan you are.
Cap’n Crunch contains some ingredients that are controversial among vegans, as explained below.
Is Cap’n Crunch Vegan?
Many vegans will be okay with eating Cap’n Crunch cereal, but strict vegans may not want to. That is because of the sugar and artificial colors found in this cereal. Let's take a look at the ingredients below.
Cap’n Crunch ingredients
Here are the ingredients in the original Cap’n Crunch cereal:
Corn Flour, Sugar, Oat Flour, Brown Sugar, Palm and/or Coconut Oil, Salt, Reduced Iron, Yellow 5, Niacinamide, Yellow 6, BHT (to preserve freshness), Thiamin Mononitrate, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Riboflavin, Folic Acid.
None of these ingredients jump out as being animal products, but there are some ingredients of concern for strict vegans.
Controversial ingredients for vegans
Sugar: As you can see in the list of ingredients, the original Cap’n Crunch cereal contains sugar and brown sugar, both of which may have been filtered through bone char. Bone char is charred animal bones and it is used as a de-colorizing filter for cane sugar to make it bright white.
Some vegans avoid all sugar that is processed with bone char, but this will be very difficult if you eat a lot of packaged foods. Product packaging does not state how sugar is processed and companies often have many sugar suppliers, some of which use bone char for processing their sugar.
The only way to avoid it is to make sure that any product containing sugar is certified vegan or made with organic sugar. Beet sugar and coconut sugar are never processed with bone char, only cane sugar is.
Artificial colors: Cap’n Crunch cereal contains artificial colors, which some vegans choose to avoid. The artificial colors in Cap’n Crunch do not actually contain any animal products, but artificial colors are sometimes tested on animals.
Vegans do their best to avoid any products that are tested on animals and any products containing ingredients that are tested on animals. But it is up to you how strict you want to be about this because many packaged foods contain artificial colors.
Does Cap’n Crunch contain Vitamin D?
Many cereals are fortified with Vitamin D3 sourced from lanolin, which comes from sheep’s wool. Luckily for vegans who avoid added Vitamin D3, Cap’n Crunch is not fortified with it.
Are other Cap’n Crunch products vegan?
All Cap’n Crunch cereals are considered vegan to non-strict vegans who are okay with sugar processed with bone char, artificial colors, and natural flavors of unknown sources.
Natural flavor can be made from plants or animal products, and it is often impossible to find out, even when contacting companies.
Some other ingredients you will see below are mono and diglycerides and glycerin. Both of these ingredients could be made from plants or animals and this is a risk that some vegans are comfortable with, while others are not.
Here is a breakdown of Cap’n Crunch products and the controversial ingredients for vegans that they each contain.
Cap’n Crunch’s Crunch Berries: contains sugar, natural flavor, artificial colors.
Cap’n Crunch’s Peanut Butter Crunch: contains sugar.
Cap’n Crunch’s Oops! All Berries: contains sugar, natural flavor, artificial colors.
Cap’n Crunch’s Crunch Mega Berries Snack Pouches: contains sugar, natural flavor, artificial colors.
Cap’n Crunch’s Oops! All Mega Berries Snack Pouches: contains sugar, natural flavor, artificial colors.
Cap’n Crunch’s Chocolate Caramel Crunch: contains sugar, natural flavor, artificial colors.
Cap’n Crunch’s Chocolatey Churro Bites: contains sugar, natural flavor, artificial colors.
Cap’n Crunch’s Ocean Blue Artificially Maple Flavored Syrup: contains natural flavor, artificial colors, caramel color (may be made from sugar that is processed with bone char).
The following Cap’n Crunch products are not vegan because they contain milk ingredients:
Cap’n Crunch Treats – Cap’n Crunch’s Crunch Berries: contains milk, sugar, natural flavor, artificial colors, glycerin.
Cap’n Crunch Treats – Cap’n Crunch’s Peanut Butter Crunch: contains milk, sugar, glycerin, natural flavor.
Cap’n Crunch’s Berrytastic Pancake Mix: contains milk, sugar, artificial colors, mono and diglycerides (potentially sourced from animals).
Cap'n Crunch FAQs
Is Cap’n Crunch dairy-free?
There are no dairy ingredients in Cap’n Crunch cereal, but cross-contamination may occur. You can reach out to the company to ask about the risk if you have an allergy.
The following Cap’n Crunch products do contain dairy:
Cap’n Crunch Treats – Cap’n Crunch’s Crunch Berries
Cap’n Crunch Treats – Cap’n Crunch’s Peanut Butter Crunch
Cap’n Crunch’s Berrytastic Pancake Mix
Is Cap’n Crunch gluten-free?
It does not appear that any gluten is intentionally added to Cap’n Crunch cereal products, however they do contain oat flour so there is a high risk of cross-contamination. Oats are often an issue for people with a gluten allergy, so it’s probably best to avoid Cap’n Crunch if you have an allergy or are very sensitive to gluten.
Cap’n Crunch products are NOT certified gluten-free.
The Cap’n Crunch Berrytastic Pancake Mix does contain gluten.
