Easter may be over, but it isn’t too late to welcome a brand new hare into the mystical Brotherhood of Breakfast Bunnies.
It’s a pretty exclusive club, consisting of only the Trix Rabbit and Quicky from Nesquik Cereal. Despite his floppy ears, Count Chocula has been repeatedly denied membership.
No one knows what goes on in the BoBB, but we can only assume it involves cereal sphere chakras, milky meditation, and making fun of the Cadbury Bunny’s silly clucking. Now the Annie’s Bunny has joined their ranks, as Annie’s Homegrown has just released three new organic breakfast cereals: Cocoa Bunnies, Berry Bunnies, and Frosted Oat Flakes.
I had to try Frosted Oat Flakes first; since the other two rabbits have fruity and chocolatey cereals covered, Frosted Oat Flakes seemed like the freshest concept. If breakfast cereal were a fighting game, “Frosted Oat Flakes” would be the Annie’s Bunny’s signature finisher move.
The name and appearance of the flakes makes me imagine a frosted version of Trader Joe’s Toasted Oatmeal Flakes. Nature Valley’s Baked Oat Bites recently improved on perfection by being a frosted version of Cracklin’ Oat Bran, so if Annie’s succeeds here, 2016 is poised to be “The Year of Making Things Better with Glazed Sugar.”
The texture and crunch of Annie’s Frosted Oat Flakes is certainly lighter than TJ’s oatmeal flakes, but it’s certainly far heartier than an average corn or bran flake: think Raisin Bran Crunch after an intense gym session.
The flavor isn’t particularly complicated, either. If your imagination is still up for it, here’s another mental picture: imagine breakfast cereal as a kung fu movie. Annie’s Frosted Oat Flakes would be the wise hermit sensei that Tony the Tiger studies under to improve his Frosted Flakes from “Grrreat” to “Grrracing the ethereal plane of nirvana.”
That’s because the cereal tastes a lot like Frosted Flakes with a superior oat base. This toasty oat base tastes like solidified oatmeal with notes of granulated cane sugar and golden wheat. Meanwhile, the sticky vanilla coating on each piece gives the flakes a powdered doughnut-esque finish.
Since this is a “healthy” cereal, though, the overall sweetness is a bit disappointingly subdued. I hoped pouring milk onto my cereal would unlock their sugar chakras.
And in a way, I was right. The luchador tag team of vanilla extract and milk pushes your taste buds against the ropes for a tasty and creamy tiger feint kick. But just one kick. After that, the sweet masks come off, unveiling a gritty base that is now more boringly wheat flavored than oatmeal flavored.
Nothing about Annie’s Frosted Oat Flakes is bad, but it won’t be winning any championship belts. It’s just not sweet enough to take away Trader Joe’s “Oatmeal Flake Kingpin” title. The outrageous $4.99 price Whole Foods charges for each box isn’t justified, either, unless there’s a secret gold nugget at the bottom of the bag I’m not aware of yet.
Better keep mining my way through this cereal to find out. Maybe I can at least chop the box into bits and sell it back to Whole Foods as “High Fiber Artisan Quinoa.”
The Bowl: Annie’s Organic Frosted Oat Flakes
The Breakdown: Vanilla aficionados and those looking for a healthier Frosted Flakes will be pleased by this crunchier than average cereal, but sweet-toothed and budget breakfasters are better off with the cereal aisle’s other bunnies.
The Bottom Line: 6.5 bowls of Rey MysteriO’s out of 10
(Quick Nutrition Facts: 130 calories, 3 grams of fiber, 8 grams of sugar, and 3 grams of protein per 2/4 cup serving)
I love Annie’s Oat Flakes. They are not real sweet and the taste is a treat for my taste buds. This is the best cereal on the market.
Awesome article. I read your posts all the time and you always
do a good job articulating the whatever topic you’re blogging about.
Btw, I shared this on LinkedIn and my followers loved it.
Keep up the great work!
I paid $1.69 for the box at grocery outlet in San Francisco.
Even at a cheap price they were not selling fast.
Our family always had real oatmeal since childhood. But once in a while a great treat if the stuff is super cheap!
Hey, anybody remember BucWheats cereal,from the 1990s?
It was a hearty, thicker flake of just wheat with a nice honey-sugar glaze. It was my favorite and Annie’s Oat Flakes reminds me of them. In the early 2000s Safeway’s Organics brand had another hearty wheat cereal that was also similar to Annie’s. Can’t find either of them anymore, so Annie’s is the current winner.I love the crunchiness of the flakes because they hold up very well to milk. I hate soggy cereal that becomes mushy before it gets to my mouth. And this one is great as a snack even without milk. LOVE IT!
Nice throwback! If that’s your type of cereal, I’d recommend Trader Joe’s Toasted Oatmeal Flakes, too.
I really like Annie’s Organic Frosted Oat Flakes. I like them because they are not overly sweet. I’m just glad there is a plain oat flake that you can buy in a local store, ours being WalMart.
Hey I dig your cereal site as I am a cereal head myself. This cereal reminded me of Frosted Wheaties, which makes sense because Annie’s Homegrown is now owned by General Mills, and both boxes are the same shade blue color. It’s Frosted Wheaties, only organic style and less sweet.
Thanks for being a fan, Raymond! And great comparison with Frosted Wheaties; I hadn’t thought of that, but you’re totally right.
I’m actually with Adam. Though “plain” corn flakes and frosties aka frosted flakes aren’t the fanciest cereal in the aisle they are solid and really good. As I must mentioned somehow in one of my comments half oats, half corn flakes/frosted flakes an apple cut into chunks and milk still makes one of my longtime favorite cereal combinations. With that in mind a earthier or a more “oaty” version of frosted flakes would probably solve the half oats half cornflakes problem and reading your review made me urge for a bowl of coa flakes (at least that’s the name I just came up with for the previous mentioned combination ;)) until I came to the point were you mentioned the prize of those little fellas… So: not even if I had the chance to buy them here in Germany! Like never. I will stay with oats and the corn based siblings. ^^
BTW looking forward to your reviews of the other bunny shaped cerals ^^
i need to figure out, why there is no profile picture when posting from my phone… -.-
(sorry about that!)
We’ll see how long it takes before even my aching pockets are willing to pen up for $10 worth of more bunny cereals!
I tend to have a very soft spot for Frosted Flakes, which, while maybe not “healthy,” are really simply made with only a few ingredients, and just very solid as both a snack and in milk. I love the malty sweetness and glazed mouthfeel, and I tend to like how the corn base is crispy without being crunchy.
I do really like the RBC flakes, though. I wish they made a cereal just with that and the clusters, because I hate raisins. As it stands, though, I would never pay 5 bucks for a box of cereal unless it was coming in blue and white box from Korea, if you catch my drift.
OreOh yeah, I know what you mean! 😉