If you, like me, set a New Year’s Resolution to get fit, but have been set back by leftover pie, half-empty frosting cans, new cereals, and every other sweet treat whose scent lifts me off the ground like a euphoric Looney Tunes character, then I have a solution for you.
Just buy this cereal and tell people you’ve been getting Shredded at the gym every day.
But don’t tell them that you really mean you’ve been eating Peanut Butter Chocolate Blasted Shreds straight from the box in the little nook by the broken cardio machines, snarling at any post-jazzercise grandma unfortunate enough to cross your crumb-strewn path.
Not-so-secret gluttony aside, I’m stoked to review the first of General Mills’ two new Blasted Shreds cereals (the other being Cinnamon Toast Crunch). I’ve heard many good things about Peanut Butter Chocolate, with some ranking it as a last-minute dark horse in their Best Cereals of 2017 list, and others just in awe that the whole bicep-curl-friendly box weighs over a pound.
So whether you’re bench pressing the box or just doing some spoon-to-mouth deadlifts, let’s all get absolutely Shredded together.
Never thought I’d use this term without a court-ordered cease-and-desist, but wow, these Shreds are a real mouth playground.
Seriously: the texture of this cereal is worth the cost of admission alone. While Kellogg’s Frosted Mini-Wheats are fat but airily thatched, Shreds are slim and super dense, with their wheaty infrastructure weaving a tight, crispy cobweb. Interestingly, the squares also melt in your mouth more than they do aggressively crunch.
Coupled with the thick pillowy flavor powder, this makes each square a taste bud-caressing novelty. An esophageal fidget spinner, if you will.
On second thought, please don’t.
The flavor of Peanut Butter Chocolate Blasted Shreds is also a whirlwind of emotion. Or more like a desert sandstorm. It’s super dry—the powder dried out my mouth like Mr. Peanut doing the cinnamon challenge. But it’s also aggressively nutty and slightly salted—just not terribly buttery. If Reese’s Puffs run the PB cereal game like a well-peanut oiled machine, PB&C Blasted Shreds stay true to their namesake legume and its dry, golden roasted savory–sweetness.
I don’t have much to say about the chocolate taste, because there isn’t a lot of it. There are undertones of semisweet cocoa powder that persist through the aftertaste, but this is PB’s world, and chocolate’s just beanin’ in it.
Milk and Peanut Butter Chocolate Blasted Shredded have a complicated relationship even Zuckerberg couldn’t classify. On one hand, milk washes away the dry-roasted nuances that make this a finger-food-friendly cereal. But at the same time, it eliminates the dry mouth problem and it leaves behind a chocolatey endmilk that is, to quote a famous cartoon principal and ham steamer: “Delightfully devilish.”
Peanut Butter Chocolate Blasted Shreds has its fair share of minor problems—in addition to those listed, it gets soggy super quickly, and the unadulterated shredded wheat base can often be intrusively bland, a shortcoming that keeps it from topping Chocolate Mini-Wheats Little Bites as my favorite shredded wheat cereal. But ultimately, its unique take on peanut butter flavor (and textural innovation in general) is well worth a try, especially if the hyper-sweet butteriness of other PB cereals drives you nutty.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ll be hitting the scale.
By which I mean actually using it as a punching bag so I don’t have to see the effects of an all-Shred diet.
The Bowl: Peanut Butter Chocolate Blasted Shreds Cereal
The Breakdown: Needs more chocolate, butter, and moisture for my now-Saharan trachea, but this authentically peanut-blasted cereal is still charming enough to rival Xplosive Pizza Goldfish for the Flavor-Blasted title belt.
The Bottom Line: 7.5 steamed hams out of 10
I cannot find Shreds cereal anymore at Stop and Shop or Target where I used to buy it. Can I purchase Shreds on line?
My son and I love this cereal, but I’m finding it hard to find in stores now. Bring it back.
Mine was not hard at all, but I really like plain shredded wheat as well. I found a few boxes at Dollar General so couldn’t pass up the chance to sample it for a dollar! I’m a bean pole and can use the extra calories, plus love the extra fiber and protein in a cereal I use as an occasional snack.
Meant Dollar Tree!
It was like water and oil it just don’t mix, the one thing I don’t like about it and I hated the most it was so hard even with the milk, maybe they need to try apple cinnamon Shredded Wheat, because there Cheerios crunch cinnamon now that’s good cereal.
my wife went to albertsons down the street (Las Vegas, NV) from my home, they have this cereal but its marked “clearance” i hope this does not mean its going away, i hate finding stuff i like, then it goes away from some reason, this happens a lot.
This is my new favorite PB cereal. It tastes like muddy buddies in milk. The texture is perfect and the taste is perfect. This is a 10/10 cereal for me. A true love letter to PB fans. I might love this more than cake….I’m odd I know lol
It’s my new favorite cereal. I always laugh when I pick up the box, I love how heavy the boxes are! I definitely prefer the cereal in milk and not dry, as the milk softens everything and makes the peanut butter creamier. And the name is outrageous and long, which caught my attention right away, and I love saying it in full.
I found this cereal at a local Dollar Tree store Bronx, NY. This cereal is impossible to find and I love it. How can we get this cereal which is hard to find locally in NYC. I hope you have a supply for sale for us “Shred” eaters.
Didn’t realize they were so wheaty, and being that I have a gluten allergy, I had to throw them out after the first bite. 🙁
Absolutely love the PB Blasted Shreds. Great source of fiber,with my favorite cereal flavors, peanut butter and chocolate!
LOVE the new PB blasted Shreds – with or without milk or a cereal bowl!! But haven’t been able to find them in my nearest super markets recently.
Love it, but like Alissa, not with milk. I place some in a baggie and they instantly become a daytime snack.
yup same here, i take them to work with me, the protein in the cereal is just enough to suppress my appetite until lunchtime and until i can get home. love this stuff.
I love it. The cereal is sweet, crisp, high in fiber and very fulfilling.
It taste like muddy buddies… I like it but not with milk
Absolutely loved it. Even better if you put it in a bag and shake powdered sugar on it. Taste like puppy chow. YUM
I agree
Just tried this .Not a fan.Peanut butter taste seemed fake tasting .For my money the Cocoa Rice Krispies have the best chocolate flavor iv’e tried thus far.
I actually really like this cereal. I felt like I was eating the chocolate peanut butter Cheerios too fast, so I bought a box of this. This cereal has the same amount of calories by weight but way more fiber. I find it more filling than the Cheerios for that reason. My 1 year old daughter likes the cereal too though I have to break each piece in half for her tiny mouth!
Ate this for dinner. Woke up at 3 with the worst acid reflux ever. Both Shreds are a one and done for me.
Your not supposed to eat this at night. It will give you heart burn, plus it has a lot of nutrients they give you energy for the morning. Give it another try, but for the morning and it will give you a new lift!
This cereal gave me the worst heartburn I have ever had in my life. I didn’t think it could be from the cereal so I ate it again the next day. The pain was so bad that I thought I was having a heart attack. All this occured while regularly taking Rx omeprazole for acid reflux. I stopped eating it & the pain went away. Oh yeah – the comment from Kimberly was one of the most ridiculous things I have ever heard in a review. At first I thought she was being sarcastic. This cereal, as well as all other cereals, should be okay to eat in the morning and at night too. This cereal is not packed with nutrients any more than most other cereals except for maybe the protein from the peanut butter. But wait – it isn’t peanut butter. It has sugar, peanuts & monoglycerides. This is no better for you than peanut butter & chocolate candy. This cereal tastes weird to me. My hubby & I both disliked the taste overall.