Living in a Cereal World

I really thought Honey Bunches of Oats was getting out of the granola game; they hadn't released anything new in ages. Now here comes three new flavors: French vanilla almond, maple pecan (I guess the  cereal did well), and the one I decided to try last week, toffee almond. You don't see the word "toffee" in too many cereals/granolas. So it's still the cluster-y kind of granola they've made before, like extra large Bunches removed from the cereal. Light, airy, and crispy. But does it taste like toffee? That's hard for me to say. I'm not a big candy eater, and toffee wouldn't be a go-to flavor for me anyway. I will say this: it tastes like a delightful toasted caramel. If that's your definition of toffee, then toffee away 🙌. My only issue was the one sliced almond in my small sample size. I'm sure the rest are in there somewhere.

Now that I know it's not   "Cheerios Cinnamon Oat Crunch" I'm guessing the order of descriptors means there could be another flavor in the future. Maybe peanut butter? (Yes, I still miss  Peanut Butter Multi-Grain Cheerios !) Anyway. I don't know why I thought I wouldn't like this new Cheerios. Something about it just seemed extra-sweet, like it had way too thick of a coating, trying to get kids to eat Multi-Grain Cheerios. But that's not the case at all. Of course you know how much I love cinnamon, so that may have helped. So it's basically a bunch of Multi-Grain Cheerios coated in cinnamon and then rolled around in some tiny bits of oats. That's different; I suppose oat clusters are getting kind of tired. That said, I still wouldn't eat a whole bowl of this--it's just the perfect topper to jazz up something a bit more plain.

Just thought I'd take a quick break from the deluge of new cereals (seriously; I have at least two more next week) to give a baking update. First, for the Fourth I wanted to make a pie. Preferably a mango-blueberry pie. But I couldn't find exactly what I wanted. So after consulting a few different recipes I started with this  Rustic Raspberry-Peach Pie recipe from King Arthur Flour but used (almost) two cups of mango, two cups of fresh blueberries, and a 12 oz. bag of frozen raspberries. It turned out that only my brother and I like raspberries, so I probably should've used more mango. Also the amount of tapioca was a bit too much--I used it all because who knew how much water the raspberries would give off?--and made the filling almost jam-like. Again, more mango might've helped with that, too. I also made it a regular pie instead of "rustic" like the recipe and it actually sealed up nicely. If I hadn't been so busy that day (I made that pie first thin

I did not know what I was getting into when I picked this up yesterday. It was more of a knee-jerk reaction: New Kashi? Yes. Okay, so I did check for potential allergens first, but considering that it says "by kids" on the box, I'm assuming it's geared toward the majority of kids. What I really meant by that introductory sentence was that I didn't pay attention to the shapes, or bother to read the description on the back on of the box. "Honey Cinnamon" was all I needed to know. So it took me by surprise when I found two different shapes inside: spirals (like Cinnabon cereal) and square puffs (like the size of Shredded Wheat bites, but the same corn-grainy texture of the spirals). Also, they're filled with apple puree. That was a surprise. I think I would've called this cereal "Apple Cinnamon" instead. It reminded me of apple cinnamon Nutri-Grain bars. The only downside was the chewiness once drowned in milk. But that's how I e