Tag Archives: caramel

Review: Dunkin’ Donuts Cereal – Caramel Macchiato & Mocha Latte

New Dunkin' Cereal Review

Not since the egg predated the chicken has such a causality dilemma been posed: “but first, cereal” or “but first, coffee”? I’m sure you’ve seen the latter phrase emblazoned on countless Etsy shirts and flea market embroideries—right next to the Live, Laugh, Love pillows and fat chicken kitchen décor—but with cereal serving as a perfect toothsome preface to just about any activity, sometimes one can face cognitive gridlock when forced to choose between a warm mugful and a cold-milked bowlful.

But worry no longer, crunchy koan ponderers, because Post & Dunkin’ have teamed up to reanimate the Donut-slinging brand’s cereal division, which has laid dormant since Ralston stopped making their chocolate and glazed goodies in the late ’80s. Granted, these two new cereals are based on coffee drinks rather than doughnuts, but that simply gives you an excuse to dunk a real cruller in your caffeinated cereal endmilk.

Yes, it is this last point that makes Dunkin’ cereals so significant—there have been mainstream coffee-flavored cereals before, but none that dared bring real bouncy bean juice into a supermarket aisle already known for sugar-rushing young kids: the last demographic that needs more energy. Sure, Dunkin’ cereals only contain 1/10th the caffeine of a cup of coffee per serving, but if my own childhood cereal consumption velocity is any indication, those perky percentiles will add up fast—the length of a single SpongeBob episode kind of fast.

But enough pep talk, let’s simultaneously eat and drink our breakfast. Continue reading

Spooned & Spotted: Dunkin’ Cereal (Mocha Latte & Caramel Macchiato!)

New Dunkin' Donuts Cereals 2020 Mocha Latte & Caramel Macchiato

 

(UPDATE: Just today, Post confirmed these Dunkin’ Cereals will be released in late August, with 1/10th the amount of caffeine in a coffee cup per serving!)

Well this was certainly more of a jolt to my brain than any shot of espresso.

Long-time Cerealously readers may remember a rumored Dunkin’ Donuts Caramel Macchiato Cereal that was rumored a year and a half ago, evidenced only by an image with fewer pixels than the cereal has grams of sugar per serving. But then…nothing ever came of it, which wasn’t too much of a shocker, since the cereal was alleged to be caffeinated, which seems like a recipe for wall-bouncing disaster to any unsuspecting parent. And Caramel Macchiato wasn’t the only bit of blurry breakfast gossip that never materialized—though perhaps hope for Cinnamon Honey-Maid and Teddy Grahams Cereal need not be extinguished by doubtful dairy just yet.

Folks, call your boss and take off work, ’cause Dunkin’s pouring us a doppio.

Snack_Alert on Instagram is the first to share proof that both Caramel Macchiato Cereal and a Mocha Latte Cereal are coming soon from Post and Dunkin’. Though it’s doubtful that these crunchy coffees will be caffeinated for real, they’re both made with real Dunkin’ coffee, instantly elevating this above any hypothetical Starbucks Cereal (yeah, I went there). Of course, Dunkin’ has big shoes to fill: the non-slip work boots of Fred the Baker, to be specific.

Dunkin’ Donuts’ original 1988 cereal came in both Glazed and Chocolate varieties. The cereal didn’t last long, but its colorful pastel box alone has made it one of cereal’s most unforgettable discontinuations.

Will the puffs and marshmallows of 2020’s Dunkin’ cereals be able to live up to this reputation? Well, without the ability to erase time and bring us closer to their uncertain release date, we’ll all just have to hunker down with some Timbits Cereal.

Review: Caramel Apple Jacks

New Caramel Apple Jacks Cereal Box

Whether it’s Blue Moon ice cream or a glass of cold water at 3:00 a.m., some things have flavors that defy conventional description. Adjectives hardly do them justice. And to me, this is a great thing. The best part of exploring eccentric foodstuffs is having a taste take the words out of your mouth and stuff appetizing abstractions in their place.

That’s not to say Caramel Apple Jacks are mind-bogglingly good—just that this review is about to be a real struggle because we’re dealing with some serious fourth-dimensional stuff right here.

It doesn’t help that even regular Apple Jacks have a complicated history of not including apple ingredients, then quietly adding them recently—even though the loops are still way cinnamon heavy. So muddling the mix even more with caramel, whose flavor is best described as “caramelized,” only makes my job harder.

Regardless, this is basically the first ever meaningful variant of Apple Jacks (save for Cinnamon Jacks) that didn’t just change the pieces’ shapes or color, so I have to try my darnedest to wrangle up a crew of strapping young sentences and hogtie this taste down. Continue reading

Review: Kellogg’s JUMBO SNAX (Corn Pops, Frosted Flakes, Froot Loops & Apple Jacks!)

Kellogg's JUMBO SNAX Review Snackable Cereal

Yes, pictured are the complete contents of one of each JUMBO SNAX 0.45oz pouch.

Look out, Frosted Honey Bunches of Oats—you’ve got an usurper approaching your throne of supreme cereal unnecessity. If you thought “Honey Bunches with 66% rather than 33% of its constituent components glazed in sugar” was silly, meet Kellogg’s JUMBO SNAX: four classic cereals enlarged so they’re…more…snackable?

Ah yes, of all the issues plaguing breakfast cereal, my main concern is that the darn stuff keeps slipping through the sieve of sausages I call fingers. I can’t tell you how many thriving ecosystems of microorganisms I’ve nourished beneath stadium bleachers where lost Loops go to be resorbed by Earth’s foundations.

But sorry, mosses who’ve evolved to masticate: no more free rides! This boy has enough JUMBO SNAX pouches to strap a bandolier with Jacked-Up Jacks and Weapons-Grade Caramel Corn.

So now that I’ll have no trouble doing so, let’s articulate the nuances of each variety. Continue reading

News: Caramel Apple Jacks are Coming Soon!

New Caramel Apple Jacks Cereal

It might not look like it, but the above cereal is historic.

See, in the entire history of Apple Jacks, there has never been a limited-edition flavor that isn’t, well, apple or cinnamon—and marshmallows don’t count either. Instead, just about every “new” Apple Jacks variant introduces a new shape—some more sublimely strange than others, but most ending up inexplicably dyed blue.

Which is why Kellogg’s new Caramel Apple Jacks promise to bring a breath of freshly preserved air to the brand. Reportedly releasing this June. In a surprising bout of geometric consistency, Apple Jacks didn’t even try to shape these green-replacing sienna hoops into like, half-melted Werthers cubes, or even a blue rutabaga (you know, just because).

For a cereal that’s never really tasted much like apples, it will be interesting to see whether Caramel Apple Jacks are another one-note wonder, or if their sticky sweetness will be worth bobbing into a tub of milk for.

I, for one, hope the back of the box at least includes a recipe for fermenting Apple Jacks cereal dust into a fine, caramelized cider.

Review: Rice Krispies Treats Caramel Snap Crackle Poppers

New Caramel Snap Crackle Poppers Review - Rice Krispies Treats - Box

Cereal is for squares.

No, really. Though of course all food is three-dimensional, especially the well-rounded corn puff, but when it comes to crunchy quadrilaterals, we get a lot of squarish, rectangular, and pillowy things, yet never any perfectionist-pleasing union of six squares. Hence why cereal scholars have been asking for decades: when will breakfast enter its cubist period?

Following their controversial performance piece “The Bastardization of Rice Krispies Treats Cereal,” A.M. auteurs Snap, Crackle and Pop are back with a freshly caramelized coat of paint on last year’s Snap Crackle Poppers. So while I loathe what’s become of RKTC with every snap and crackle of my boiling blood, this line of miniaturized and glazed Treats is actually pretty good—especially the Cookies ‘n’ Creme ones.

It’s surely only a matter of time before Kellogg’s piggybacks off this geometric success to release Raisin Bran bites in the shape of Metatron’s Cube. But in the mean time, let’s see how the Rice Krispies boys’ latest inherently stackable snack stacks up to its predecessors. Continue reading

Review: Malt-O-Meal & Cold Stone Creamery’s Cookie Doughn’t You Want Some?

Malt-O-Meal & Cold Stone Creamery Cookie Doughn't You Want Some Cereal Review Bag

Look, I’m all for cool (especially the literally cool) cereal collaborations, but I’m sensing an ulterior motive with this one.

Malt-O-Meal & Cold Stone Creamery’s Cookie Doughn’t You Want Some? is the latest in their ice cream cereal series, after Birthday Cake Remix and Our Strawberry Blonde. And it has to be a secret social experiment by Post (M-O-M’s parent company) to see just how long they can make a cereal’s full, legal name  before they drive snacky journalists wacky.

Well to that I say, nice try, but I’ll just turn it into an ugly acronym that actually takes more exertion to craft than typing it out.

So I know I really buried the lead here, but M-O-M&CSCCDYWS? is making a bold statement by claiming it contains cereal pieces actually flavored like cookie dough (while pairing them with marshmallows, but I doubt anyone in today’s marbit-fatigued zeitgeist really cares about that). There’s been little creativity in the chocolate chip cookie cereal scene as of late, ever since Keebler Cereal and its tragically puff-smothered cookie bits keeled over. That’s why there’s a lot riding on Cookie Doughn’t You Want Some? to be more than just another Cookie Crisp chaser.

Now that I’ve told my spellcheck’s autocapitalization settings to not even bother, I can answer the in-sentence question Cookie Doughn’t You Want Some? exists to ask:

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Review: Honey Bunches of Oats Apple Caramel Crunch

Post Honey Bunches of Oats Apple Caramel Crunch Cereal Review Box

You’ve heard of snack attacks, but what about sneack attacks?

No, that’s not a typo: I firmly believe that Honey Bunches of Oats has perfected the art of the 800-pound guerrilla breakfast bombardment. Not even counting the recent, off-brand and Internet-splintering news of Honey Brunches of Oats Chicken & Waffles Cereal, the now 30-year old cereal brand has a history of dropping sneakily scrumptious new flavors at the start of the year, without the preemptive fanfare we see from most crunch-slingers.

In 2016, the masters of crispy (fried poultry or otherwise) flakes and granola bunches brought back Chocolate Honey Bunches of Oats, and in 2018 we got the criminally underrated Pecan & Maple Brown Sugar HBoOats. Pulling another break-fast one on us, 2019 has now been blessed with Apple Caramel Crunch Honey Bunches of Oats.

More than just an exciting concept, this is only the second major caramel apple cereal after 2011’s bone-mealed Caramel Apple Boulders. Where caramel apple’s sister flavor, apple cinnamon, gets a lot of cereal aisle representation—including an apparently discontinued(?) Honey Bunches variety—I’m glad to see its stickier sibling finally getting exposure.

Even if it is half a year before caramel apple’s typical seasonal setting of booing and bobbing. Guess I’ll just have to cut some eyeholes in my winter-grade weighted blanket before eating.

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