Review: Carmella Creeper + Monster Mash Remix Cereals

Is Carmella Creeper good?

Yes!! Not only is it my undying delight to see a new Monster grace shelves—the first since 1987’s Fruity Yummy Mummy—but to see an actual female cereal mascot for once is refreshing, especially in the sausage fest that is the breakfast aisle.

(No, mentally unstable bovines and anthropomorphized marshmallows don’t really count as representation.)

Furthermore, Carmella is just cool. Billed as the long-lost cousin of Franken Berry (however the murky genealogy of lab-created lifeforms works), she’s a hip ‘n’ happenin’ DJ who would never be caught un-undead with the likes of someone lame enough to still use the phrase “hip ‘n’ happenin'”. Though that wouldn’t stop me from uncool-ly inviting her to get gas station sushi and play Kirby Air Ride (she’d decline, but politely).

…

Wait, you were asking whether Carmella Creeper the cereal is good?

Oh, heavens, no. Not at all. No no no no. Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: general mills, halloween, monster cereals. 16 Comments

Jun. ’23

Review: Maple Brown Sugar Chex

Dearest Corn,

Look, I know I’m probably the last person you want to receive a letter from. In fact, you probably called me a “mother-shucker” and popped a movie-theater-buttered blood vessel just seeing my name on the envelope. But I owe you an apology. Several, actually.

I’m sorry for blaming the death of the already undead Monster Cereals on you. I’m sorry for calling you “a starchy scourge that’s turned the cereal industry into a (literal) husk of what it once was.” And I’m sorry I double-dipped that tortilla chip in the guac when no one was looking.

Because the truth is, while, yes, 99% of modern cereals that use your milled flour as a base turn out to be terrible—as the flavors basted on top struggle to contend with your maize-y twang—there’s also another kernel of truth that says there are good corn cereals. In fact, there are corn cereals as outstanding in their field as the scarecrows that guard them. These mostly include those cereals that wear their corniness on their weathered flannel sleeves: the Corn Flakes, Corn Pops, and dearly departed Corn Bran Crunches of this world.

And yes, Corn Chex, too.

You see, I’ve noticed something: amongst all the endlessly reproducing Chex varieties, whose choices of base grain always seem arbitrary, the corn ones always trump the rice ones. Honey Nut Chex? Peanut Butter Chex? The likes of Blueberry and Apple Cinnamon are glass cannons of flavor-blasted blandness in comparison to you, corn, and your comparative golden-toasted heartland heartiness.

Now, Maple Brown Sugar Chex belongs amongst that elite Chexian Corps., too.

So here’s to you, corn. You’re a hull of a guy, after all. Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: chex, general mills, maple. 4 Comments

May. ’23

Review: ICEE Cereal

// Partial Transcript of Oral Research Report 526-23, Regarding Specimen [REDACTED], Recovered from the Desk of Arctic Cereal Researcher Dan. G. — Current Whereabouts Unknown //

I know not what I’ve stumbled upon—only that it is insidious. Unnatural. Decidedly not of this earth.

Discovered in a remote crater, the particulate creature calls itself “ICEE Cereal,” and it appears to be a crude extraterrestrial attempt to mimic one of mankind’s favorite frozen beverages, though it has chosen a far less familiar form. Rather than a liquid, it’s composed of solid spheres. While it seems like the organism tried to make these small round bits solely red and blue, there exist also countless hybrid offspring in manifold hues of purple.

The thing’s ostensibly cardboard shell claims that the spheres are flavored like “Cherry & Blue Raspberry.” Every fiber of my survival instinct tells me it would be unwise to consume such a suspicious “foodstuff.” And yet, as soon as my eyes fell upon the rapturously radical (and dare I say, totally tubular), shade & sweatered anthropomorphic Polar Bear on this ICEE Cereal, I was powerless to resist its allure. Perhaps this is some new form of visual memetic virus? If so, I can only pray this ICEE Cereal kills me before such a maliciously compelling mascot can be allowed to reach civilization.

So to my ancestors and descendants alike I say: please, forgive me for what I am about to crunch and/or munch. Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: kellogg's. 15 Comments

Mar. ’23

National Cereal Day News Round-Up

Happy National Cereal Day! Y’know, the day that always sneaks up on me because it falls on such an innocuous date that I end up scrambling to write something for it around 7 at night.

I wish I could celebrate this National Cereal Day with better news, but you’ve probably noticed Cerealously posts have been pretty few and far between lately. The reason why is a little hard to admit, but nevertheless I must be honest: keeping up with this blog just isn’t as fun as it used to be. Don’t get me wrong, I still love cereal, but as with anything you do again and again for a long time, after nearly 8 years of cranking out wordy reviews for every new cereal to hit shelves, it’s gotten a little tiring—and often feels more like an obligation than a relaxing hobby. Not to mention, changes in my personal and professional spheres, as well as new writing and creative projects, have taken up a lot of my free time and energy.

So, sorry to say, but probably don’t expect an uptick in posting frequency any time soon. For Cerealously’s first 7 years or so, I almost never took more than a couple days between posts, so I hope you can understand why I need a little break—until I can confidently say that cereal blogging is fun again, rather than because I feel I have to. I won’t call this a formal hiatus, since I’m sure I’ll pop in with a review or two now and again, but I nevertheless look forward to returning refreshed and hungry when the time is right. My deepest thanks to all of you, long-time readers and newcomers alike. If it weren’t for you all, I would’ve stopped years ago. Be sure to sign up for email updates through the site’s sidebar if you’d like to be immediately notified when I make my grand return.

Rest assured, though: I’ll still be doing The Empty Bowl and posting cereal news etc. on my Twitter. Again, it’s all about time, rather than a lack of subject matter passion, and recording a podcast or shooting off a tweet is way easier than a 700-word blog post.

That said, I’d feel bad leaving you on National Cereal Day with only a sad little “see ya later”—that’d be like getting broken up with on Valentine’s Day. So let’s round up a handful of exciting cereal-aisle developments from the past week or so, shall we? Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: News. Tags: cerealously, news. 12 Comments

Feb. ’23

Review: Sweet Dreams Cereals

Aw jeez, gotta write quick: I feel like I’m reviewing on a timer here, like an Evangelion unit disconnected from its power supply. If I trail off mid-sentence, you’ll know that Sweet Dreams Cereal worked and I fell asle

…

Just kidding, I’m still here and (debatably) lucid. Though my eyes are feeling heavy—but is that because Sweet Dreams, the first cereal designed to be eaten at night to promote restful sleep (with its natural melatonin production-supporting vitamins & minerals), actually works, or because it simply bores me to sleep? Well, turn on your device’s blue-light filter, slip into your finest Sleepytime Tea Bear nightgown/sleeping cap combo, and we’ll all find out together. Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: blueberry, honey, post. 1 Comment

Dec. ’22

Counting Down the 5 Best Cereals of 2022!

Woof, what a year: and that’s saying something, since I’m a cat person.

I’ll be honest, this was the hardest end-of-year best-of list I’ve had to put together since starting this blog in 2015. Sad to say, but 2022 just was not a strong year for new cereals. You know it’s bad when two out of my top 5 released way back in January, and another didn’t even reach mainstream shelves at all.

I’m no economist, gastronomist, nor Nostradamus, so I really can’t make any authoritative statements on what went wrong with ’22’s meagre chews and what that bodes for the future of cereal, but if I could summarize my observations in two words, I’d go with misplaced innovation. I know that sounds heinous considering how big of a proponent I am for doing new things in the cereal aisle, but when those new things consisted mainly of collectible hypebeast box collabs and the kind of temperature thaumaturgy that resulted in the year’s two worst cereals, maybe by “innovation” I mean I just want to see decadent new flavor explorations, rather than flashy cardboard or outright alchemy.

But enough about the bad apples: let’s focus on the good noodles. Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: Specials. Tags: best of, cerealously. 9 Comments

Dec. ’22

Review: Cheerios Oat Crunch – Berry

Senioritis is real.

In my fourth year at the fancy-pants math & science high school I went to—which I mention not as a brag, for it was essentially just a safe haven for nerds who’d get be-swirlied and de-lunch-moneyed otherwise—my annual research group fell so far from our former graces. Where once we studied the effects of atmospheric conditions on things like coffee acidity and laser attenuation, we ended our esteemed tenure like a squeaking mouse fart in the night, deciding instead to determine the effect of a potato’s surface area on its rate of osmosis….a question so obvious that a root vegetable hooked to a battery could probably figure it out.

Naturally, our teacher admonished us but ultimately let us get away with it, because once you’re mentally checked out with the tantalizing liberation of college on the horizon, it would take a menacing cyborg library cop to check us back in. And luckily, our little geek asylum wasn’t that well funded.

Why do I bring this up? Because “Berry” is now the fourth member to join the Cheerios Oat Crunch family of cereals, an esteemed breakfast dynasty that I’ve no-doubt given more consistently positive feedback than any other cereal line reviewed on this site. Between the tongue-hugging warmth of Cinnamon Oat Crunch, the golden perfection of Oats ‘N Honey (well, other than that imperfectly stylized ‘N), and the nutty nuance of Almond Oat Crunch, Cheerios G.O.A.T. Crunch has truly done no wrong…

…and now we have Berry.

I think you can see where I’m going with this. Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: cheerios, oat crunch, raspberry. 2 Comments

Dec. ’22

News: 3 New Special K Flavors, Coming this January

Wow, three whole Special K flavors? Hitting stores this January? What a tr—hey, you: wake up! I get it, new Special K news doesn’t exactly wow me, either, but that’s not excuse to fall asleep in the back of class. This will be on the test, you know.

And hey, new Special K cereals aren’t always (entirely) boring. I mean, c’mon, there was that okay chocolate-dipped one last year, the genuinely tasty blueberry lemon yogurt one five years ago, and the cinnamon apple one from…aw, geez. Seven years ago? Fine, I agree: three above average new cereals over the entire tenure of this blog isn’t exactly a storied legacy, but at least the first of this incoming Special K trifecta looks promising. High Protein Chocolate Almond sounds decadent, and since “high protein” usually correlates to “high calorie” in the breakfast aisle, we can at least trust this one to be sweet and filling enough to be worth the effort it takes to chew its densely grained nuttiness. Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: News. Tags: almond, chocolate, cinnamon, froot loops, kellogg's, news, special k. 1 Comment