Professor Yeti

Beginning when I was just a young girl, I’ve been known as being a bit moody in the morning. Who can blame me? Most days, getting out of a warm bed to sit at a cold desk (or in the summer, get out of a cool bed to sit in the hot sun) seems like a sick joke.

The only thing that could rescue my mood was a really great breakfast. I dreamed about eating pancakes with lots of syrup, scrambled eggs with bacon, and delicious, delicious sausage. It was a rare morning in my youth when I was served any of these. Most mornings my dad would make hot Malt-o-Meal cereal for my siblings and me. Malt-o-Meal cereal is okay, but certainly nothing worth jumping out of bed for (hence the mood). If you’re not familiar with it, hot Malt-o-Meal is sort of like a shy cousin of oatmeal. We usually got the chocolate kind.

Next I entered into the cold cereal phase of my life. Maybe my dad got tired of making us breakfast in the morning, or maybe we revolted against Malt-o-Meal. I’m guessing it was a bit of both. At that point, my mom started buying cereal, which turned out to be mostly Rice Krispies or Cheerios, i.e. healthy cereals. Aided by a little grocery-store coaxing, my mom began experimenting with sugary cereals. My favorite was Cookie Crisp, the next best thing to eating cookies for breakfast.

Now I’m at a point of my life when I have the ultimate power: the power to choose my own breakfast. Within reason, I can eat anything I want in the morning. If I really want to, I can eat a Denver omelet every morning. Why don’t I? Well, for one thing, I don’t usually feel like preparing a big meal first thing when I’m still groggy. For another, I may as well forget about eating it and just staple the omelet to my thighs, because that’s where it’s going to end up anyway. So the ideal breakfast food is delicious, easy to prepare and reasonably healthy.

This breakfast search of mine lead me back to the cereal aisle, to Raisin Bran. I always thought of it as an adult cereal, one that people only ate because it was good for them. I bought it.

The first pour of Raisin Bran into the bowl shows that the advertising is right: there are a lot of raisins, or at least more than I expected there to be. The bran flakes look healthy and brown. The amount of raisins in the package brings up an interesting question. As far as I’ve seen, each box, no matter what the size, claims that it contains “two scoops” of raisins. Does this mean that the smallest box gets the same amount of raisins as the largest box? That would be absurd. Could it mean that all boxes get two scoops, but the scoop size varies according to the size of the box? I’d like to know.

My first bite is crunchy and includes two raisins. My second bite is identical to the first. The hearty crunch of the bran flakes is offset by the soft, chewy sweetness of the raisins. As I continue eating the cereal, each bite is delicious and contains at least one raisin. Forget about those kiddie cereals — Raisin Bran is delectably sweet.

I’ve heard some people complain that Raisin Bran flakes get soggy in milk. I think these people are being unreasonable. Of course they get soggy in milk — every cereal does. Even the cereals that say they don’t get soggy actually do. It’s the way of the world. I’ve come up with two simple solutions to this common problem. The first solution, which I promote, is to eat the cereal fast enough so that the bottom flakes only get a little bit soggy. The second solution, which I’m not really a fan of, is to pour yourself a little bit of cereal with milk, eat it, and then pour yourself some more. . . . Doesn’t this seem too work-intensive? Just eat it fairly quickly.

I believe I’ve found in Raisin Bran my personal best breakfast. I give it high marks in preparation time and overall deliciousness. I’ve also heard it can help keep you regular, but I guess I’ll find that out in time.

Melinda Cameron wakes up happy now.

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 2nd, 2006 at 11:52 pm and is filed under Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.