Living in a Cereal World

Good idea: birthday cake! Bad idea: overindulging in birthday cake (plus eating a cereal  I shouldn't have been eating , among other factors). It was simple, I thought: find a recipe for a small cake--so we could finish it well before Thanksgiving--preferably with no icing, and not too much effort. Well, this  Banana Upside-Down Cake  fit the bill. I love upside-down cakes. I've made pineapple (of-course), apple, pear...why not banana? And it's a very moist cake. Probably why I ate too much. It's just too tempting. Two notes: mine stuck a little bit. I couldn't quite put it back together; luckily no one cares about style points at home. And while two large bananas were  the right amount for my 8x8 pan, I had to cut around some bruises, which left empty spaces on the cake that should've had banana slices. But if you like big bites of caramel, it's not really a big deal.

Or, A Lesson in Reading Labels. So, I've had this cereal stashed away for a few weeks (with hot cereal season upon us it's taking up more of my mornings) and last week I finally noticed a warning on the box: contains pecan, walnut and almond ingredients. I'm sure I've mentioned this before but I'll try to put it in the nicest terms possible again: all nuts--except almonds!--upset my stomach. So now I'm concerned, because I really want to try this cereal (and not waste my money). I decided this morning to pour just enough to cover the bottom of the bowl and mix with other cereals--that would be enough to review, anyway. And...it's not as peanut butter-flavored as I would've liked. Which was really disappointing, considering it's Jif  cereal. Now maybe it has more natural flavoring than the other peanut butter cereals I like, but it still wasn't enough for me. Oh, and later, when I'm brushing my teeth, here comes the tummy discomfort. So

I know, I know, it's been months but I'm just now getting to this one. I peeked in the bag before pouring--the cereal looked awfully familiar but I couldn't place it. It had that sweetened sheen and puffy texture that is not  characteristic of most Cheerios. Next I tasted a cluster. It was surprisingly nutty. I know there's almonds involved but the flavor of the clusters makes it seem as if there's no oat component at all. Impressive. Then I tried the Os. That's  where the cinnamon is. It really caught me by surprise. My mind must not have been on breakfast yesterday morning, because I knew what flavor this was. I purposely chose to open it the day after I bought it even though I could've waited. Overall, I need to try it again to get the overall effect. Separately, though, plenty of cinnamon and almond. (Half an hour later it hit me:  Fiber Plus Cinnamon Oat Crunch . That's what these Os remind me of, but with different grains.)

Now this  is oatmeal in a tub. Or cup, if you prefer. I think tub's cuter. Anyway...I wasn't planning on ever trying another one of these oatmeal tubs after my disappointing experience with  Special K Nourish  but I had a coupon plus I love the Protein Granola (seriously, one of my favorite new products this year) and  I just happened to be in Target yesterday, where I knew I could find it. The coupon was for two; luckily both flavors were appealing. This morning I had the Cranberry Apple Crunch. Upon ripping off the lid (all the way--oops) I saw the amount of oatmeal, which looked reasonable, and really big pieces of dried apple. Nice . All I had to do was add boiling water--the preferred method--stir, and cover. After the three minutes were up it was still a little thick for me but adding more boiling water helped. The oats look like they could be rolled oats (the label doesn't specify); they're definitely not the typical ground-up instant oats. Finally, flavor:

(Banana-rameters?) My mission, should I choose to accept it (I did): bake a cake on short notice with a cake mix, preferably Bundt and/or pound. I found three options from my recipe box and it was decided: I would make this  Banana Pudding Cake . Bonus! No icing required. I picked up a Betty Crocker Super Moist cake mix because it was the cheapest, not realizing that a) It's called "Super Moist" because it already  has pudding in the mix and b) it's not the size called for in the recipe. But does 18.25 even exist? Is that an old size? You know how products these days keep getting ounces shaved off and they think no one'll notice. I  notice. So anyway, I ended up with a super-Super Moist cake, what with the extra pudding and the mashed banana. But, surprisingly, it held together. I didn't have a runny batter or  a mushy finished product. And everyone seemed to enjoy it. I could've used a recipe with more banana, though. We'll see if that ends up being

1. I was finally able to find some Thomas' Pumpkin Spice English muffins while they were still in stores. The flavor isn't all that much different from their pumpkin--without the swirl, of course. But there's still plenty of spice in every bite. I didn't even feel the need to add any sort of topping. 2. New this year from Celestial Seasonings: Caramel Apple Dream tea. I had to try it based on the name alone. The scent of the unwrapped box teased a drinkable apple pie. The flavor? Not that far off. Definitely a stronger apple taste but the caramel comes through at the end. It's slightly different from their Cinnamon Apple Spice and a little bit better in my book.

...those spices pull me back in. I had some leftover canned pumpkin so I looked up non-oatmeal pumpkin cookies and found these:  Old-Fashioned Soft Pumpkin Cookies . Well, I figured, it's the brand I have, so they can't be that bad. And they're not bad, not bad at all. They have that soft chewiness that happens when you make a moist pumpkin cookie dough, but it's not gummy or weird. Just a little bit chewier than, say, your average chewy chocolate chip cookie. I also didn't feel like making the glaze, so I threw some dried cranberries in there. I put them in my pumpkin bread, so, same difference, right? I think so. Good cookie.

At least I think it's new. Apparently Kashi used to make granola and then they stopped and then they started up again...I don't know. I should really make up my mind to do some research sometimes. But anyway, to the granola. The clusters have a nice crunch to them--attributable to the chia?--and aren't too sweet, as I've come to expect from Kashi. And if you're a fan of raisins you're in luck; this mix is loaded . I'd say in my one serving the other day the ratio of granola to raisins was pretty much 1:1. In look and in flavor this reminds me of Cascadian Farm cinnamon raisin granola but possibly better. This'll require more testing.