Yearly Archives: 2021

19

May. ’21

News: Mystery Flavor Pop-Tarts

Mystery Flavor Pop-Tarts Box

Hmm, moustache flavor?

Ooh: sunglasses flavor?

Well, I’m all out of ideas. I guess it’s hard to guess when I haven’t tasted new Mystery Flavor Pop-Tarts, or Mister E. Pop-Tarts, as they’re calling them. At least we won’t have to wait long, as Mister E. Pop-Tarts are hitting shelves this month. Here’s the origin story from Kellogg’s:

“How did this flavor come to be? Rumor has it, a masked culprit broke into the Pop-Tarts factory and created a mysterious and delicious new flavor. Pop-Tarts loved it so much, they hired Mister E, a world-class flavor investigator and title character on the new Pop-Tarts box, to solve the case. 

But Mister E needs help from Pop-Tarts lovers everywhere! Fans are invited to share their best flavor guesses for a chance to win epic prizes. After taking a bite, just scan the QR code on the box to visit the entry website and submit your guess. The sweepstakes opens May 27, 2021.”

Honestly, I’m more interested in whether there’ll be a canonical answer as to who the “masked culprit” was. Maybe that’s just a copyright neutral way of explaining why the mystery flavor is like, Crunch Berries or something.

Ultimately, this isn’t the first time a toaster pastry brand has tested our taste buds with an edible enigma: Walmart’s Great Value Toaster Pastries had a mystery flavor back in 2018. I don’t think the truth was ever fully revealed—and the taste was super generic, so I said “Fruit Punch.” Hopefully Mister E. Pop-Tarts—whatever the heck they are—are distinctive enough to tantalize the tip of my tongue.

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18

May. ’21

News: Team Cheerios & General Mills Oatmeal (x4!)

New General Mills Cereals 2021

CEREAL 2021: RISE OF THE MEALLY OAT

Honestly, I’m starting to think a weird game of telephone went on at General Mills HQ. They heard our continued cries to restore oat flour to their Monster Cereals (which didn’t work), and interpreted it as “people want more cereal-flavored oatmeals!”

But hey, I’m not complaining—because it finally gives me a chance to talk about hot cereal on this site, which I coldly and rarely do, despite claiming to be a blog for all cereal. As you can see in the above image, posted this week by General Mills, there are a number of releases we already knew about, plus some surprises. Namely, Lucky Charms Oatmeal and Cinnamon Toast Crunch Oatmeal (both of which have previously released as Canadian exclusives), plus new Cocoa Puffs Oatmeal and Trix Oatmeal. If I had to guess, I’d predict Cocoa Puffs will be the standout star, as chocolate tends to infuse beautifully into oatmeal—especially when you toss in some chocolate chips that melt into lovely little landmines.

Team Cheerios Returns for 2021

Also of note here is the return of Team Cheerios. This stuff first debuted way back in 1996 to support the U.S. Olympian team, but it stuck around for a few years after as a Wheaties-esque celebration of all things athletic. Interestingly enough, despite the cereals discontinuation, you’ve always technically been able to enjoy the stuff, provided you’re willing to invest in a 96-count box of Team Cheerios Strawberry Cereal Bars.

However, while the original Team Cheerios combined regular, Multigrain, and Frosted Cheerios with an added brown sugar booster, 2021’s reunion is “Frosted Berry” flavored, which I would guess means these are a sweeter version of Very Berry Cheerios. Either way, I’m skipping the milk and eating these with Gatorade for peak performance.

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17

May. ’21

Bite-Sized Review: New Strawberry Rice Krispies Treats

My cereal cupboard overfloweth, so a tweet will suffice for this pink eat (that kinda looks like meat).

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14

May. ’21

Quick Review: Kellogg’s Together with Pride Cereal

Aw man, we were this close to seeing a squad fight in the cereal aisle.

See, Kellogg’s first cereal team-up with GLAAD—raising awareness and funds for LGBTQ+ rights—was “All Together Cereal.” This infamous Super Smash Bros. Ultimate of cereals may not have actually combined six cereals in one box (they were mini boxes inside a bigger box), but I was hoping that in future iterations Kellogg’s might get bolder and try loose mixing + added DLC characters. It also would’ve been convenient timing for All Together to return, just as hype is building around the General Mills’ marbit-soup that is Monster Mash Cereal.

Franchise vs. Franchise. That would be like if Smash Bros. crossed-over with…Digimon Rumble Arena 2.

But nope, instead we get a note-for-note technicolor remaster of 2019’s Caticorn Cereal. Together with Pride tastes exactly the same, and Caticorn wasn’t exactly memorable. If I didn’t have a big fluffy mystical white cat myself, that crunchy cryptid would’ve dissolved into my subconscious aether a year ago.

Like Caticorn, Together with Pride is very generically fruity. It’s difficult and unproductive trying to detect any traces of raspberry or strawberry specifically, because it all gets gummed together by a sticky sugar sheen and the additional cloying sweetness of each piece’s “edible glitter.” Imagine the fakest berry taste you can, then make it hollower and glossier.

Milk can help tone down the artificiality a bit, but Together with Pride’s color evokes Froot Loops, and with that I can’t help but compare the two. What this needs is a juicier, more tropical twist, because as it stands…I’m just gonna leave this bowl standing here.

Maybe it’ll solidify into a cereal milk candle.

The Bottom Line: 4 good causes with bad executions out of 10

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13

May. ’21

News: Cap’n Crunch’s Chocolate Caramel Crunch + Churro Bites!

New Cap'n Crunch Chocolate Caramel Crunch Cereal Box

Cap’n Horatio Magellan Crunch is a weird guy. In fact, I once wrote an op-ed about how the Cap’n is one of the last remaining bastions of cereal’s ’80s & ’90s golden era, back when off-the-wall breakfast gimmicks were a dime a chocolate-coated dozen. While other cereal brands were trying to remove artificial ingredients and promote active, on-the-go mealtimes, Cap’n Crunch was still wack-adaisically dropping Creamsicle and Cotton Candy cereals—not to mention atomically colored Slurpees and pancake syrup.

And don’t even get me started on Canuck Crunch.

As a result, I’m always eager to see what else this kooky Cap’n and his detached eyebrows has up his nonsensically nautical sleeves.

That said, I’ll admit Quaker’s latest Chocolate Caramel Crunch isn’t quite as inspired as the Cap’n’s other seafaring fare—the combo of chest pieces and flavored Crunch Berries reminds me of the lackluster Chocolatey Berry Crunch. But I am interested to see if there’s better caramel flavor here than in the likewise *meh* Cap’n Crunch’s Caramel Popcorn Crunch. Continue reading →

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11

May. ’21

News: Trix Yogurt Returns

Trix Yogurt Returns!

Ever seen a grown man lean back, squeeze and gulp a whole yogurt cup like he’s a lactobacillic Popeye? Well, for the sake of my area’s grocery store security guards, I sure hope they have, because if there’s no precedent or protocol in place, they might have a tough time stopping my toot-tooting Trix Yogurt-powered form from bench-pressing the dairy cooler.

I’m just that excited about Trix Yogurt returning to conventional stores. I say “conventional” because, though Trix Yogurt has been hard for mainstream consumers to track down for years now, this sweet pastel nostalgia slop has been available in bulk to General Mills’ foodservice partners for some time. But while the foodservice includes fun, familiar flavors like Strawberry Banana and Raspberry Rainbow, Trix Yogurt’s brick-and-mortar revival is stripping back the silliness to just two straightforward tastes: Strawberry and, uh, straw-less Berry.

This is a bit sad, since I’ll miss Cotton Candy and Wildberry Trix Yogurts most of all, but I understand how it’s hard to make the same “healthy low-fat snack” pitch to lunch-packing parents when the stuff is flavored with abstract or otherwise fictional ingredients.

But hey, if these newly returned Trix Yogurt cups are as good as the smoothie version from last year, I’m willing to bury the hatchetfruit and start making some umbrella’d summer yogurt cocktails. Let’s get silly!

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09

May. ’21

UPDATE: Monster Mash Cereal

New Monster Mash Cereal 2021

(UPDATE: Read my review of Monster Mash Cereal!)

And on this day, Mother’s Day 2021, General Mills delivered something beautiful into this world.

Well, sort of. It’s complicated.

First off, we’ve known about the above Monster Mash Cereal—which brings all five iconic Halloween cereal mascots together—for some time now, but it was always shown with placeholder box art featuring Monster renders taken from collectible pins. This raised alarm bells among skeptics, but now thanks to Cerealously reader Mikey H. (seriously: thank you!), we can put all doubts about Monster Mash cereal to a peaceful rest.

See, the stuff is now listed on Instacart, and in addition to featuring this clearly more-finalized box art, this listing gives us a few more hints about the broader Monster Cereal 50th anniversary that prompted this gift of a quintuple feature.

“…the world’s most monster group is back together for a limited-edition cereal, and to record their own version of the greatest monster anthem of all time.”

There’s also a mention of MonsterMashCereal.com, where you can listen to the Monsters cover the actual Monster Mash classic, but the site isn’t live just yet, so you’d better develop some werewolf’s paw-thick finger callouses and start pressing CTRL+R between now and late summer, which is when each year’s Monster Cereals typically get formal announcements.

However, I think the most fun thing to speculate for now is just what this cereal will look like in a bowl. Besides the claim that marshmallow shapes and colors may vary, the lineup at the box’s top suggests a very marbit-heavy cereal with just two ghost pieces. These two appear to be Boo Berry and Franken Berry pieces, with the other Monsters represented by respective marbits.

I’m torn on this: on one hand, it’s smart to leave Chocula ghosts out of the mix, since every other Monster Cereal is fruit forward. But at the same time, I really hope the marbits have unique flavors, otherwise this is just another generic berry cereal with Brute and Mummy painted on for nostalgia value.

Guess there’s nothing left to do but wait and find out. If you need me, I’ll be in a sensory deprivation mausoleum to prime my autumnal appetite.

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03

May. ’21

Review: Special K Dipped Chocolatey Almond

New Chocolatey Almond Special K with Chocolate-Dipped Flakes Box

Dipped. Dunked. Coated. Frosted. There are many dramatic ways—each dastardly and delightful—to bestow chocolatey goodness upon an otherwise indecently nude food morsel. I’ll be honest that I didn’t really know there was an industry distinction between chocolate-coated and chocolate-dipped flakes, but thanks to this allegedly groundbreaking new variety of Special K, we can be assured that choco-coated flakes are totally boring ol’ fudgy-duddies, while their dipped brethren are show-stopping pioneers in their field.

That’s a lot of hype for the cereal equivalent of Lay’s chocolate-dipped potato chips, which ended up having more charming novelty than rubber dog poop, but far less than those top hat-wearing drinking birds. Those guys have charm and novelty dripping down their felted chins! Let’s see how hip this chocolate dip really is.

(It was between that lame rhyming line and “let’s see how fun this ‘due really is.”) Continue reading →

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