I was once content with being a mere granola observer. But thanks to Nature’s Path Organic Ancient Grains Granola, I’m a believer.
You see, I used to view granola as cereal’s athletic and beefy older sibling. While cereal and I were happy crashing on the couch with a bowlful of technicolor sugar whirlpools, granola was climbing mountains of Greek yogurt and swimming in protein shakes. I never hated granola for being more active than me, but you better believe I turned up the volume on The Price is Right when he walked into the room.
But all that has changed. After a failed search for Sam’s Club’s economy-sized boxes of Multigrain Cheerios + Ancient Grains, I braved Costco instead for something to satisfy my ancient yearnings. And despite sounding like the premise of another Scorpion King sequel (they made five of those movies?), that Costco quest led me to this epiphanic tweet:
It's 1:32 A.M. and I just ate the greatest granola of my life. More to come on this soon…
Oh Cap’n, my…wait a minute. Yarr, this isn’t Cap’n Crunch’s Crunchberries! This be Mom’s Best Cereals’ quasi-generic rendition of Crunchberries: Jungle Berry Crunch!
Shiver me timbers: how embarrassin’! This be just like the time I meant to fly a carrier pigeon to me scurvy mate with the message “ye bringin’ the grog on the ‘morrow, matey?” and accidentally flew it to me own ma, instead. I was grounded like a landlubber for fortnights.
Oh, aye, ye may be wonderin’ whyabouts I be blubberin’ like a pirate. Well let ol’ Danbeard spin ye a briny yarn about this here cereal of the sea. Jungle Berry Crunch may sound like it belongs in some scallywag’s Zimbabwean vacation, but it tastes like something a treacherous buccaneer like ol’ Jean LaFoote himself would find when marooned on a tropical island!
Please, oh please, Nature Valley Chocolate Oat Bites: you have to be better than Attack of the Clones.
Let me explain what I mean by this. I recently came to the conclusion that my experience with General Mills’ new 2016 line of Nature Valley cereals closely parallels my experience watching the Star Wars films.
Nature Valley’s “original trilogy” provided an exciting plot arc. First, Chocolate Oat Clusters brought an innovative breath of fresh air to the breakfast table. With its fudgy decadence and rich clusters, Chocolate Oat Clusters gave me A New Hope that grown-up cereal could be fun.
Then Baked Oat Bites Struck Back. With layers of sour cream doughnut complexity, it improved on Cracklin’ Oat Bran’s seemingly un-improvable formula. Finally, Honey Oat Clusters happily rounded out the saga with a Return to its predecessors’ doughnut-esque delightfulness, but it lacked a sense of cliffhanging, compelling intrigue.
I thought the fun was done there, but then Nature Valley announced two more cereals. The first, Raisin Oat Clusters, was a bit of a disappointment. It was less imaginative and more dry. And unlike the other movies, The Phantom Menace didn’t even taste like a bakery dessert!
Wait a minute—I think I mixed my metaphors there.
That’s a long-winded way of explaining how Chocolate Oat Bites—the newest Nature Valley cereal—has to break the cycle. Attack of the Clones may not have been the worst Star Wars film, but I sure wouldn’t want to watch it for breakfast every morning. Continue reading →
Since I’ll be spending tomorrow stuffing my face with hot dogs while watching others competitively stuff their faces with lemonade-soaked hot dogs, I figured I’d go light today by munching on Kellogg’s seasonal Limited Edition Red, White, and Blue Rice Krispies.
Truth be told, I’m glad the only Independence Day-themed cereal available this year (we’ve had Summer Berry Pebbles before) is this one. Since it tastes exactly the same as normal Rice Krispies, I can celebrate this most laid-back holiday of the year with an appropriately laid-back review.
So, uh, yeah: if you’ve had Rice Krispies, then these taste the same. No strawberry or blueberry taste—just neon colored food dye soaked into airy rice crisp niblets. They don’t really taste like anything, for that matter. If you grit your teeth and focus like Jimmy Neutron during a brain blast, there are notes of lingering toastiness, but few people are likely to eat these as a traditional cereal (whether dry or with mush-ifying milk) anyway.
These Red, White, and Blue Rice Krispies are destined to be bathed in butter and marshmallow for use in Rice Krispies Treats. I would have made some for the purposes of this review, but I’m saving all my butter and marshmallow fluff for use in my annual “Fourth Of July Butter ‘n’ ‘Mallow Slip’n Slide,” a tradition that I totally didn’t just invent to explain why I don’t have the ingredients for Rice Krispies Treats in my house.
My family just loves apostrophes, okay?
Instead, I made you this to make up for it. These Red, White, and Blue Rice Krispies lose points for not tasting especially fun and for not having enough red and blue pieces, but in the spirit of the holiday, I’ll give ’em a few extra just for being so darn festive. Don’t hesitate to buy a box if you ever wanted to make your own cereal American flag.
Or your own cereal flag for Australia, Cambodia, Chile, the Cook Islands, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cuba, the Czech Republic, Dominican Republic, the Faroe Islands, France, Haiti, Iceland, North Korea, Laos, Liberia, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Nepal, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Panama, Paraguay, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, Russia, Samoa, Schleswig-Holstein, Serbia, Sint Maarten, Slovakia, Slovenia, Taiwan, Thailand, or United Kingdom, for that matter.
Uh, yeah, there are a lot of red, white, and blue flags.
Happy early Fourth of July, everyone: I hope all your fireworks Snap, Crackle, and Pop!
The Bowl: Rice Krispies with Red & Blue Krispies
The Breakdown: They’re Rice Krispies. They taste like Rice Krispies. Also there are red and blue ones. I want hot dogs.
The Bottom Line: 7.4 (see what I did there?) hot dog bun-shaped Rice Krispies Treats out of 10
(Quick Nutrition Facts: 120 calories, 0 grams of fiber, 4 grams of sugar, and 2 grams of protein per 1 1/4 cup serving)
“No no, you must have misheard me,” I said to the cashier. “I want to buy Annie’s Berry Bunnies cereal, not Very Moneys cereal. In fact. I don’t think Very Moneys is even grammatically correct.”
And that’s how I ended up making a cashier grimace and walking home with a $5+ box of cereal.
I’ve joked before about how Annie’s three new organic cereals are hare-raisingly expensive, and how in the case of Frosted Oat Flakes, it made me not want to purchase them again. Yet here I am, pouring another bowl of mauve & marmalade colored baby rabbits. If you weren’t impressed enough with those color names, allow me to consult my Behr Paint Color Guide and get even more specific:
“…another bowl of Muscat Grape and Acapulco Sun colored baby rabbits.”
There, that one would make even a Home Depot employee proud.
These are not the discontinued Frosted Chocolate Vanilla Creme Pop-Tarts you once knew and loved. No: these are Frosted Chocolate Vanilla Crème Pop-Tarts!
Do you see the difference?
It’s that sophisticated “è,” which requires you to serve every pastry as an appetizer, hors d’oeuvre, or dessert at a classy dinner gala.
See, the è has never appeared on packages before: not when Chocolate Vanilla Creme Pop-Tarts were first introduced (no one knows exactly when—not even the authoritative Pop-Tarts Wiki), not when they were discontinued in 2009, and not even when they were briefly revived in 2014 as a Limited Edition flavor for Pop-Tarts’ 50th birthday.
But now these Chocolate Vanilla Crème Pop-Tarts, complete with the accent mark, are back as a Kroger store exclusive and wrapped in debonaire foil before me. Time to scarf one down with my pinky out, like a true toaster pastry gentleman. Continue reading →
“That’s Life,” I said, doing the world’s worst Frank Sinatra impression in the Kroger breakfast aisle as I gazed upon Quaker’s new Vanilla Life cereal.
“That’s what all the people crunch. You eat it dry in April, with milk in May. But I know I’m gonna change that tune, when it’s all soggy—all soggy in June.”
Okay, now that I’ve gotten all the Weird Al Yankovic out of my system for the day, I can crunch into these brand spankin’ new and vanilla sugar sparklin’ squares.
Though it has a rather subdued box and no mascot ever since Little Mikey grew up and inspired urban legends about Pop Rocks-related deaths, Life Cereal has had many interesting varieties. From 1978’s Raisin Life to 2002’s Apple Life, multiple flavors have went through the “circle of Life,” delighting Mikeys everywhere before their eventual discontinuation.
In recent years, Quaker has stuck to a trilogy of Original, Cinnamon, and Maple Brown Sugar Life. But since Maple Brown Sugar doesn’t appear on the side of my Vanilla Life box, this newbie may have unofficially usurped his syrupy older brother.
You have to taste really good to redeem yourself now, Vanilla Life: I take any insult towards maple syrup as a personal offense. Continue reading →
Raisin bran as we know it needs to evolve. Can Nature Valley’s new Raisin Oat Clusters help bring it from its Cro-Magnon hunch to an upright state?
See, bran flakes with raisins is one of cereal’s oldest traditions, dating all the way back to Skinner’s Raisin Bran. But while species of Toast Crunch cereal evolved from swirled squares to full on maple glazed mini bread slices in just over a decade, all raisin bran has done in its 90 years of existence is add oat clusters and maybe a few measly almonds.
Sure, there’s been the occasional innovator, like Raisin Nut Bran with its nut-coated raisins or the unfortunately discontinued Raisin Bran Extra! But by and large, survival of the fittest has been more of a “survival of the fattest, juiciest raisins.”
I demand more. I demand a raisin bran that will blow my mind instead of just my colon. It’s time to find out if Raisin Oat Clusters, one of Nature Valley’s two newest cereals, is up to the task. Continue reading →
