Journalist Spy Revealed The Queen Had Some Charmingly Common Daily Habits

As the world transitions from the death of Queen Elizabeth II — the only monarch of the United Kingdom most living people had ever known — and into the reign of King Charles III, tributes and memories are pouring in from far and wide. Those who knew her personally or who had the chance to interact with her are sharing their memories of the United Kingdom's longest-reigning monarch, and they're almost uniformly fun, heartwarming, or funny. That tracks: Though the queen always comported herself with the dignity and decorum that was expected of her due to her position, she was also a loving, joyful, and jocular woman who wasn't above poking fun at herself.

She was also one of the wealthiest women in the United Kingdom, and with the possible exception of living for a few months on British Army rations during her service in World War II, she never once knew want or privation. Nevertheless, she was known to have simple tastes in some areas, especially when it came to food. Though she had the best chefs in the world in her employ and access to the best food, she enjoyed off-the-shelf cereal for her breakfasts. What's more, a journalist who sweet-talked his way onto Buckingham Palace's payroll uncovered her way of keeping her cereal, and it's likely more in line with how your own grandmother or great-grandmother keeps hers.

Imagine that you have all of the money. Now imagine that, with the snap of your fingers, you can have anything you want prepared by one of the best chefs in Europe, prepared with the freshest of ingredients, brought to you on a silver platter, with servants to clean up after you. What do you eat for breakfast? If you were Queen Elizabeth II in her old age, you'd have eaten cereal and yogurt, according to The Independent.

We know this because, though Buckingham Palace tightly controls the narrative about what goes on within its walls, a journalist managed to get on its payroll and serve as a sort of "spy" within its walls. And the secrets they revealed were the opposite of salacious: they were entirely mundane. Specifically, the queen enjoyed plain cereal, such as Weetabix (pictured above). What's more, she stored the leftovers in Tupperware containers, in much the same way that any other Briton not wanting to see their food go to waste would.

Of course, the similarities ended there. She also got her food served to her by footmen, and each utensil had to be in exactly the right place. For whatever it's worth, the queen's lawyers considered the whole thing a "flagrant breach" — employees are bound by strict confidentiality agreements — and sued to have this information kept from being published (via The Independent). But of course, the suit went nowhere.