I can’t resist a maple cereal, especially one that’s made with real maple syrup like Nature’s Path Organic’s gluten free Sunrise Crunchy Maple.

How much do I love maple syrup?

Well let’s just say that I would willingly abandon my human body if it meant transplanting my brain into a robot that runs on a syrup and oil mixture. Especially if that robot were a futuristic police android that patrols the Vermont-Canada border.

Can you tell I’ve thought a lot about this?

But I’ve been burned by some maple cereals in the past. They claimed to have bold maple flavor, when really they just tasted like a maple leaf briefly photosynthesized in their general direction.

I can’t resist the allure of that sticky tree sap for long, though. I’m willing to open my syrup encrusted heart once more for you, Sunrise Crunchy Maple. Don’t let me down.

Let’s just get this out of the way first: this cereal’s name is only 66.66% accurate. Yes, there’s lots of maple flavor and lots of crunchiness, but I didn’t taste any sunshine. When a cereal calls itself “sunshine,” I expect plenty of real flaming hot electromagnetic plasma flavor.

Let’s get back to that heavenly crunch. There’s three types: a hearty crunch from the corn and flax flakes, an airy crunch from the wispy quinoa puffs, and a crispy crunch from the little crispies scattered throughout. With so many fun textures, it’s like an amusement park for the palate.

The puffs and crispies provide little flavor, though. The flakes dominate with a corny, brown sugar sweetened base that has an unfortunate bitter edge from all the flax seeds and buckwheat.

This can be off-putting, but since “corny with a bitter edge” is pretty much how’d I’d describe my personality back in high school, I’m willing to give this cereal some points for originality.

Thankfully, a lot of the bitterness is counteracted by the sweet, sticky coating on every piece. I’ve reviewed a lot of sticky cereals lately, but this one takes the cake. And it doesn’t let go of it either. Because it can’t.

Every corn and quinoa bit is enrobed by this coating, and it tastes like an all-star team of every sticky and sweet substance I’ve ever eaten. Genuine amber maple syrup is the most obvious flavor, but there are pleasant notes of molasses, honey, and generic sugar syrup, too.

It’s like an alternate universe episode of The A-Team starring Mrs. Butterworth, Grandma (of Grandma’s Molasses fame), Buzz the Bee, and Sugar Bear as they fight the bitter forces of flax-y evil.

Adding milk is highly recommended, as it softens the flax flavor and leaves behind an appropriately syrupy endmilk that distills all of the above flavors into liquid gold. Forget the maple and oil: I want a cyborg that runs on this.

So even though the bitterness of the flax seeds might turn away a lot of people, those who are willing to stick it out and add milk will be rewarded with a fun cereal that’s sticky and sweet without being sickly sweet.

I can’t wait to have nightmares about Mrs. Butterworth talking in a Mr. T voice.

The Bowl: Nature’s Path Organic Sunrise Crunchy Maple

The Breakdown: A “Greatest Hits” album of great crunchy textures and diverse sweet syrup flavors that’s weighed down by a few sticky and bitter tracks.

The Bottom Line: 7.5 Mountie automatons out of 10

(Quick Nutrition Facts: 110 calories, 3 grams of fiber, 7 grams of sugar, and 2 grams of protein per 2/3 cup serving)