Author Archives: jared m.

Review: Trader Joe’s Cocoa Crunch Cereal

My advertising headcanon:

The Trader Joe’s chief executive sits down to his moderately-priced (though sustainably sourced and crafted by local upper-class private school artisans) desk, attired in a three-piece Hawaiian print suit, and lays into his most recent scheme to take over weirdly specific niche markets. Sort of like J. Jonah Jameson, but with flip-flops.

“Darn it, Leonard!” His assistant’s name is Leonard, I’ve decided. “Bring me identical versions of classic sugary cereals, but without gluten! No more gluten! If it glutes, it goes!”

At this point, poor Leonard readjusts his glasses between harrowingly scribbled notes, too cowed to make eye contact with Mr. Joe. “Y-yes, T.J. Got it. And what should we do about the box art?”

A flash of wrath crosses Trader Joe’s face for an instant, before he reconsiders. “Class. That’s what the cereal aisle is missing. Come up with the most elegant possible image and slap it on both sides. Think minimal. We’ll save on advertising and appeal to kids at the same time.”

“Yes, T.J. But… how will tasteful stock photography draw in children?”

The ire returns. “Darn it, Leonard!” He reaches into his breast pocket and pulls out a small paperback book, slapping it on the desk as everyone in the building collectively winces. “This is what today’s youth want! Get me this author! She’s going to change everything!”

And that’s how Trader Joe’s recent box art came to be designed by Marie Kondo.

In another recent salvo toward more gluten-freedom, the company has paired its prior spheroid offering with a sister release—this one a bit more along traditional cereal lines. In both shape and constitution, Trader Joe’s Gluten Free Cocoa Crunch Cereal is unmistakably meant for comparison with Cocoa Puffs. It’s a puzzling move, then, to adorn the box with a deftly arranged photo of someone’s zakka-inspired place setting with the audacious phrase “serving suggestion.” But you know what? Fine. If that’s how we’re going to play it, then this review needs to go all-in.

Time to one-up this understated high-brow aesthetic. Continue reading →

Posted by jared m.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: 7 rating, chocolate, trader joe's. 2 Comments

Mar. ’19

Review: Annie’s Organic Friends Bunnies Cereal

Let’s talk turkey. Or bunnies, to be seasonally appropriate.

When you’re reviewing breakfast fare, a scale is necessary. I won’t feign presumptions on how those who write about lesser foodstuffs manage to assign numerical ratings. What constitutes a perfect 10 in, say, pizza? Are there dual systems for thin crust and deep dish? Such are the fodder phantasms that haunt my countertop in the night.

Comparatively, then, I’m grateful for pantry paragons that act as polestars. We know that no cereal on the market today can, however mighty, topple Cracklin’ Oat Bran from its lofty position—even if matched by other exceptional staples. But it’s hard to compare everything against the crème de la crunch. Once in a while, we need to be reminded that superb bowls (heyoo!) exist only in light of normal, unremarkable cereal. We grade Gaussian around these parts, folks, no matter how much one may love log.

So Annie’s released a new cereal. Sort of. Remember Annie’s Homegrown? They make feel-good versions of classic favorites, like organic boxed mac and cheese, organic graham crackers, and organic fruit gummies, all in the shape of their lagomorph mascot. It’s a cute concept, often with a nightmare-conjuring price tag. This one, for instance, runs over $4 USD at my local Walmart for a relatively dinky box.

Naturally, one assumes that quality costs more. And although that hasn’t been the case historically, hare hops spring eternal. Continue reading →

Posted by jared m.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: 5 rating, annie's, chocolate, general mills, honey, vanilla. 4 Comments

Feb. ’19

Review: Trader Joe’s Neapolitan Puffs Cereal

Let’s take a moment to admire the abject honesty of the current cereal industry. We’ve had our ups and downs, with the occasional public health outcry shaping the way our beloved commodity is branded. Sugar Frosted Flakes became Frosted Flakes. Sugar Smacks became Honey Smacks, which was refined for a period to just Smacks before reverting back to the mean. And now, in this present age of risk-taking in the breakfast aisle, companies are owning the fact that cereal is pretty much dessert. To the sugar-coated mound of donut and cookie (for breakfast?!) cereals, we’ve also seen the advent of ice cream offerings.

I’d be remiss to not point out that Cocoa Puffs did not invent the concept. As with so many deliciously carbed rituals, the Italians did it first. So while Sicilians are enjoying their literal gelato sandwiches early in the day, apparently the norm in Naples is that unique blend of strawberry, vanilla, and chocolate for which the region is named. Or maybe it’s the other way around. Sonny’s history lesson is a little vague on that one.

Trader Joe’s inexplicably decided to counter the Neapolitan Cocoa Puffs with… Neapolitan Puffs Cereal. But it’s what’s under the hood that counts, and Joe has made some special modifications. TJ looked at a fairly good cereal that does not contain beans and said, “No. This will not do.” Instead of corn, oat, or even wheat, Neapolitan Puffs is made with a similar blend of beans found in the divisive LoveGrown cereals.

Personally, I quite like the subtle beany aftertaste and uniquely forgiving crunch of Comet Crispies. At the same time, I respect that it’s not everyone’s jam (if peanuts are a legume, does that make peanut butter just bean jam?), so you can expect a fair assessment here, as well. Continue reading →

Posted by jared m.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: 7 rating, chocolate, ice cream, strawberry, trader joe's, vanilla. Leave a comment

Feb. ’19

Review: Kellogg’s Overwatch Lúcio-Ohs Cereal

It’s perfectly normal for a grown man to stress-sweat over diacritic placement, right? I remember when Pokémon first arrived on U.S. shores, and no one could figure out what to do with that funky mark over the e. Then a generation of kids learned to use hexadecimal code on our LiveJournals and all was right with the world. Well, what’s old is new again with the drop of this (figurative and literal) loot box. Blizzard has teamed up with Kellogg’s to extrude a veritable Winston of a cereal.

He’s a super-intelligent gorilla. It’s a genetic engineering joke.

And while the character’s vowel woes are only just beginning, I have to express a personal appreciation for the lack of incorrect apostrophe here. Ever wonder what happens to literature majors who manage to land a summer internship with Kellogg’s? Apparently they get to name cereals. Good on you for not going the Honey Oh’s route, anonymous typist! And we didn’t even have to sit through a diatribe about postmodern travel literature to enjoy it.

The promotion is fairly straightforward: buy a box of Lucio-Ohs (see, we’ve dropped the accent mark already because convenience… and search engines) and upload a photo of your receipt to the Kellogg’s website to receive an extra in-game loot boost. With normal loot coming at $2/box, it’s not the most cost-sensitive way to up your chances at anything legendary. As the man says, though, sometimes you’ve got to give yourself to the rhythm.

Speaking of which, Lucio is hardly an intuitive choice. We’ll probably never find out how the decision was made, and that means every night for the rest of my life I have to stare at the ceiling, wondering what Caramel Wrecking Balls might have been. Instead, the loops here are seemingly meant to represent sonic waves. Per Lucio’s default color scheme and Brazilian nationality (perhaps making him the most diverse cereal mascot on shelves at present), they’re yellow and green, so of course that means a rare lemon-lime cereal. Continue reading →

Posted by jared m.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: 5 rating, kellogg's, vanilla, video games. 11 Comments

Dec. ’18

Review: Frosted Mini-Wheats Fruit Medley

Now is the winter of our choco-mint made flower-ish summer by this rounded fork!

…oh, sorry, I’ve just been brushing up on the Bard of Breakfast, William Shakespoon. With Kellogg’s banking on a shift toward summery flavors for 2019, it makes sense to prepare now for what’s shaping up to be a very good year for lovers of fruity cereal and cereal-adjacent products. This marks a pretty drastic turn after years of mostly earthy flavors, like chocolate, peanut, almond, and even coffee.

Speaking of which, remember that time (read: a couple of months ago) when they dropped Vanilla Latte Mini-Wheats? That was an unexpected star of the year for me, and now sits in regular rotation on my countertop. So my hopes were high upon spotting a box of the new Frosted Mini-Wheats Fruit Medley in the wild.

Mid-winter is a strange time to release such a bright box, but I presume it’s just Fruit Medley’s allusion to a classic Christmas melody. You know: “…and a cardboard in a pear tree?”

If you think your cringe at that one was bad, you should have seen my neighbors while I took the photo. They kept King Lear-ing at me.

Yep. Continue reading →

Posted by jared m.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: kellogg's. mini-wheats. 4 rating. 5 Comments

Dec. ’18

Review: Wild Harvest Blueberry Walnut Cereal

The breakfast aisle is guerrilla warfare. We have Malt-o-Meal cranking out hit after hit while Aldi’s in-house brand drops the surprise bomb of the holiday season. What the Cuphead is going on here?! I’m having ancestor-flashbacks to when an imitator started dressing like Hydrox and soon became America’s Favorite Cookie. So please, stick with me for a moment while I argue that the future very likely rests on the shoulders of companies we don’t even recognize.

Sometimes, I take a trip to the local hippie grocery chain to see what’s up in the world of avant granola. It was during one such venture that I spotted this perplexing bit of cerealia perched high up on a shelf in the ill-defined “healthy cereal” section. It stood out amid Barbara’s Puffins and Kashi GoLean because, more so than any other probiotic, low-sugar, organic, gluten-free, paleo, vegan option with 1000% of your daily fiber, the minimalist art shouts “wholesome.” Screams it. Through a megaphone. While standing in front of a celery poster. This is box art that could make Teddy Ruxpin burst into apologetic tears for not giving enough warm hugs to orphans.

Meet Wild Harvest, a brand with barely any discernible history or footprint in the marketplace. The enlarged image on their milquetoastly-named Blueberry Walnut Cereal looks a lot like one of the many pretenders to the Honey Bunches of Oats lineage. An investigation of the copyright reveals that Wild Harvest is an imprint of SuperValu, Inc. Inspired by Dan’s recent tumble down the rabbit bowl, I checked more into it. Here’s hoping I don’t need a secret handshake to get in. Continue reading →

Posted by jared m.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: 8 rating, blueberry. 2 Comments

Dec. ’18

Review: Trader Joe’s Gingerbread Spice Granola

Ginger is the Michael Ironside of spices. That is to say, you may not recognize the flavor on its own, but that spicy rhizome appears in just about every baked worth its sodium bicarbonate. Like the iconically forgotten character actor, ginger is more versatile than a cyborg tardigrade. We’re talking about a guy who has shown up in everything from The A-Team to some project called Lucky’s Treasure, which seems relevant to our interests*.

And like that masterful performer, the absence of ginger is more notable than its presence. It’s no secret that a real gingerbread cereal has been at the top of our wish list for years (no, I refuse to recognize that failed prototype). Like Dan, I’m heavy on anything made of, containing, smelling like, or crafted in the same kitchen as gingerbread. Cookies? Absolutely. Cake? I believe that would be an empty plate you’re holding. Post-Thanksgiving, we’ve officially entered Hansel and Gretel territory until well into February. Trader Joe’s, ever on their seasonal jam, recently dropped this spicy bomb on us: Gingerbread Spice Granola.

As a cereal journalist-slash-critic, I have carefully tempered expectations most of the time. Not here, though. The package art alone is enough to breathe life into my Grinchy sense of objectivity (can we have Michael Ironside in that movie, too? Don’t tell me Col. Dugan harassing some Whovillians wouldn’t be a masterwork). It’s no Gingerbread Toast Crunch, but gingerbread in any form is cause for high hopes. To the bowl! Continue reading →

Posted by jared m.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: 6 rating, gingerbread, granola, holiday, trader joe's. Leave a comment

Nov. ’18

Guest Review: Trader Joe’s Crispy Quinoa Stars Cereal

break·fes·sion
/ˈbrekˈfeSHən/

noun

Noun: breakfession; plural noun: breakfessions
a formal admission of guilt for violating cereal orthodoxy

“He signed a breakfession to mixing orange juice with Cocoa Puffs. He shall be milkboarded until sunrise as penance.”

Deep breath, Jared. You can do this.

Fellow cereal heads, I have to own up to something. This goes against every sacred principle our people hold. I won’t blame you for pelting me with marbits and extruded grains of various magical configurations. But I can’t go on hiding in the pantry like this. (Literally, because it’s very small and there are, like, fifteen boxes of cereal in there. Plus potential spiders.)

Friends. I don’t like Lucky Charms.

I know. I get it! Just hear me out. The substance of Lucky’s original treasure is about as bland as it gets. Even Corn Flakes at least taste like their eponymous source material, so you can throw a mushy hoedown while contemplating the familial history of Cornelius the Rooster and the NBC peacock. What, you’ve never noticed the obvious resemblance? Something tells me Miss Prissy wasn’t the only fryer in Foghorn’s coop.

The cardboard bits turn to mush and distract from the marshmallows which, while fun, have no taste other than straight fructose. There’s no complexity going on here. Sorry, Lucky, but your two-note song just doesn’t groove me.

So when Dan drew my Trader Joe’s-loving attention to Crispy Quinoa Stars, I was less-than-enthused. The box image immediately trips my ingrained Charms avoidance. These crispy crucibles of the known periodic table look just like the dry kibble that makes LCs such a chore to eat. But, hey, a cereal journalist has obligations, and the people need to know. So let’s fly through the cerealsphere to TJ’s in my (used, beat-up, Honda) rocket ship! Continue reading →

Posted by jared m.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: 7 rating, quinoa, trader joe's. 1 Comment