Tag Archives: banana

Review: Kellogg’s Raisin Brain with Bananas Cereal

Donot mess with bananas.

I’m convinced that, for a while now, whatever divine, potassium-based organisms control the world’s banana populations, they’re powerful enough to initiate a new, yellower world order from the safety of their unassuming peels.

How do I know this? Just look at every banana cereal of note: the winsome weirdness of Urkel Os. The untold smoothie sorcery of Minions Cereal. The nutty nuance of Banana Nut Cheerios. And the baked-in brown sugar bravery of Banana Bread Shreddies.

They hardly got any buzz, yet they nearly gave me an intoxicated buzz of ethereally fruity deliciousness.

That kind of untapped, Luke Skywalker-troubling power is what makes me both fear and salivate over Kellogg’s new Raisin Bran with Bananas. RB isn’t the Kellogg’s mainstay I’d expected to take on dried ‘nanner discs (hello, Special K), but the healthiness of dry fruit does seem like an auspicious counterpart for a cereal so famously mocked for its droll, fiberous flavor.

So like Revenge of the Nerds, the oft-lampooned Raisin Bran sun is ditching his usual bunches and letting slip a fury of bunch-powered flakes.

Be careful which heavenly body you call boring in middle school.

Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: banana, kelloggs, raisin bran. 8 Comments

Feb. ’18

Review: Ideal Oats Oatmeal – 3 Flavors!

Look, oatmeal is no one’s idea of ideal.

Sure, it’s healthy, wholesome, warm, nourishing, and all that jazz, but it’s also ugly. Those moist, lumpy, and occasional drippy beige chunks? Second only to canned tuna on my list of “tasty foods I’d swipe left on if Betty Crocker made a dating app.”

That’s why I’m giving props to Ideal Oats for trying to glamorize, or at least revolutionize, the classic breakfast with a face for radio. Billed as “Oatmeal, Reinvented,” Ideal Oats not only aims to help the fitness-conscious with 20g of protein per, but it also aims to overthrow the oatmeal aisle oligopoly of Apple Cinnamon and Maple Brown Sugar by bringing in never-before-seen flavors.

Needless to say, as someone whose recent exercise log primarily consists of long walks to the back of the grocery store to buy more Reese’s Cup coffee creamer, it’s the flavors that make most excited for this review.

All three cups featured below were sent to me by Ideal Oats, but I promise the freeness of the oats won’t influence my review. When it comes to peanut butter and bananas, I don’t lie: not after the infamous “Mario Kart PB&J Incident of 2008.”

I’m still finding tear-stained crumbs in my carpet. Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: Uncategorized. Tags: 7 rating, 8 rating, apple, banana, cinnamon, oatmeal, peanut butter. 3 Comments

Nov. ’17

Review: Limited Edition Banana Nut Cheerios Cereal (2017)

The only thing I love more than bread is bread that lets me pretend I’m eating healthy.

That’s why banana bread and zucchini bread were the butten-laden cornerstones of my developmental years’ food pyramid. That’s why I’ve preserved my grandma’s mathematically perfected zucchini bread recipe into adulthood. And that’s probably why my gut is steadily taking the shape of a banana bread loaf, protruding through my shirt like T-1000 through a wall.

Even though a zucchini bread cereal is as likely as North Korea letting pigs into their no-fly zone, I’m ecstatic that we’ve seen a recent resurgence of banana bread cereals. First we got Canada’s Banana Bread Shreddies, and now fan-favorite Banana Nut Cheerios are back from whatever Davy Jones’ Pantry General Mills condemned them to for the past year or two.

And yes, I know it’s called Banana Nut Cheerios and not Banana Bread, but we all know that’s “banana nut” is a term invented by Big Bread to keep even the carb-conscious in the palm of their crust-caressing hands. But enough conspiracy: let’s slice, peel, and crack open a box! Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: 9 rating, banana, cheerios, general mills. 9 Comments

Aug. ’17

Spooned & Spotted (Australia): Despicable Me Cereal

Hey, remember just last week when I chatted nerdishly about how a trip across the border, equator, or prime meridian can drastically change the nature of a familiar cereal?

It is happening again.

Never thought I’d quote Twin Peaks in a post about Minions, but here we are. If there’s a fan art mash-up of those two things, please throw it into fire and walk with me to the eyeball bleach emporium.

Yes, here we are: as Instagram fan @ruthhewsonfit has kindly shared with us, Australia has a very unique take on Minion cereal mania. While America’s latest fortified take on those little cyclops Twinkie McNuggets was a basic oat and marshmallow mix-’em-up with a brown sugar vanilla glaze, Despicable Me: Down Under Edition is way cooler: it looks like crunchy cashews and has a unique banana smoothie flavor.

It sounds closer to the Minions Banana Berry cereal we got some baker’s dozen or so Minion movies ago (or at least that’s how it feels), but this one is made by Kellogg’s. I have to assume that those jumbo anthropomorphized Tic-Tacs snuck into General Mills headquarters, stole the formula, and then made farting noises while babbling like a ’90s dial-up internet tone.

You know, standard Minion stuff.

Big thanks to Ruth for sharing this photo that I’m equally excited to see and jealous I can’t eat. We’re jonesing for a good banana cereal here in the States while we wait for Banana Nut Cheerios to return, so if you think you can throw the cereal hard enough to reach me, it’d be much appreciated. Though given their shape, the pieces would probably come right back, boomerang-style.

Got a cool cereal snapshot from America, Australia, Antarctica, or even the Andromeda Galaxy? We want to see it and share it! Use our Submissions page or start your intergalactic transmission now.

Posted by dan g.. Categories: Specials. Tags: banana, foreign, kelloggs, movie cereals. 2 Comments

Jul. ’17

News: Banana Nut Cheerios Cereal is Returning for 2017!

(Image via General Mills. Note: this is an old box photo, as the new one hasn’t been released yet.)

It would be so, so easy to make a “going nuts” joke to open this review, but that would be too easy. I’ll hold off, because I know it would make you all go bananas.

Whoops.

But whichever gastronomical idiom you use to express your excitement, there’s plenty to be giddy about. Even after gifting us delicious new apple cinnamon and mocha cereals, as well as the sure-to-be-delicious-because-c’mon-just-look-at-them Cinnamon Toast Crunch Bites doughnut holes, General Mills is treating cereal fans like spoiled grandkids once more by bringing back Banana Nut Cheerios, a fan-favorite variety that lasted from 2009 until late 2015.

Thanks to a tip from our friend Steffen (who has a great site about foreign cereals, if you have a translator ready), the above press release confirmed that the cult favorite Cheerios were returning to shelves.

We love you, Grandma Mills: you always did make the best banana bread.

Which is interesting, because while banana nut and banana bread are similara flavors, I don’t consider them exactly the same. It will be fun to see (and taste) whether the revival of Banana Nut Cheerios is exactly the same as before, or if it draws inspiration from Canada’s delightfully dense and ripe Banana Bread Shreddies.

Or maybe they’ll just subvert all expectations and make them taste like a peanut butter banana sandwich. Speaking of which…hey General Mills, people did love your discontinued Peanut Butter Cheerios. Hint hint, wink wink, nudge nudge.

Posted by dan g.. Categories: News. Tags: banana, cheerios, general mills, news. 18 Comments

Feb. ’17

Review: Banana Bread Shreddies Cereal (From Post Canada)

Canada’s immigration website is about to crash again.

No, that wasn’t a politically motivated prediction—this blog is non-partisan, except for when it comes to the S’Mores Jungle Party. I just think that America’s northern neighbors are about to see a whole lot more hungry tourists once word gets out about Post’s new Canada-exclusive Banana Bread Shreddies Cereal.

See, the U.S. has a tragic drought of banana-flavored cereals. Sure, we have plenty of Banana Republic stores and enough bad ukulele covers of Jack Johnson’s “Banana Pancakes” to fill an audiobook, but if we want banana in our cereal, it’s oatmeal, Great Grains Banana Nut Crunch, or nothing. All the great banana breakfasts of our time, from 1981’s Banana Frosted Flakes to last year’s Minions Banana Berry Cereal, have left us for the great jungle in the sky where all bananas go when they grow brown and mushy.

And speaking of brown bananas, we’ve never had a strictly banana bread-flavored cereal. The cozy flavor of Grandma’s kitchen seems perfect for a bite-sized breakfast, which is why these Banana Bread Shreddies are sure to pique the curiosity of humans, monkeys, and Raffis everywhere.

So let’s renew our passports and peel open a box of it. Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: 9 rating, banana, canada, post. 8 Comments

Nov. ’16

Coming Soon in Canada: Post Banana Bread Shreddies

(Update: We reviewed Banana Bread Shreddies!)

Smell that?

It’s the smell of jealousy—jealousy over Canada getting a cool exclusive cereal that America isn’t. It might also be the smell of warm, oven-baked banana bread wafting over the U.S.’s northern border, but you know, that’s kind of a “chicken and the egg” type thing.

See, I’m jealous because Post’s Banana Bread Shreddies are coming soon to Canadian grocery shelves in January 2017, and we here in the states have never been blessed by a doughy, ripe banana cereal. Sure, we’ve had strawberry banana Urkel Os and the surprisingly delicious Banana Berry Minions Cereal—which had notes of browned banana—but neither of those come close to the “Grandma’s kitchen goodness” promised by Banana Bread Shreddies. I’m still waiting for General Mills to realize Tiny Toast‘s potential for amazing bread-based flavor varieties.

This news comes courtesy of Jeff S., renowned Junk Food Dog and one-time Cerealously guest reviewer. I both thank Jeff for this tip and curse him for getting to bury his face in a banana bread-flavored breakfast when I can’t.

I’ll just have to use a real slice of banana bread to mop up my morning tears. After all, isn’t that the secret ingredient for keeping it dense and moist?

Posted by dan g.. Categories: News. Tags: banana, coming soon, post. 9 Comments

Sep. ’16

Review: Quaker Banana Bonanza Oatmeal and Blueberry Bash Oatmeal

Quick: pretend you’re in 4th grade and it’s lunch time. You sit down at an uncomfortable wooden table, and tear open your hyper-crinkly brown bag while you wait for your friends to come back from the hot lunch line with their spicy chicken sandwiches and Bosco breadsticks.

You’re more than a little jealous of them, but you know Mom had to have packed you something good. So what’s the main course? Ham and cheese on rye? Leftover chow mein from China Kingdom down the road?

Both guesses are wrong. In an attempt to get you eating healthy, Mom packed Quaker’s newest instant oatmeal cup flavors: Banana Bonanza and Blueberry Bash.

But are these oatmeal cones worth trudging over to the school’s vintage, pizza sauce-stained microwave for? Or should you trade them like edible Pokémon cards and try to game Billy out of his Ziploc full of Oreos?

Those are the existential questions I hope to answer.

Continue reading →

Posted by dan g.. Categories: Reviews. Tags: 6 rating, 7 rating, banana, blueberry, non cereal, oatmeal, quaker. Leave a comment