Article about breakfast cereal

[melrose]

...and it is not just the children's obvious ones that appear to be bad for you, all bran is highest in salt and Nut clusters highest in fat........
here

I don't buy breakfast cereal. I think it is all horrible cheap carbs with virtually no goodness in it at all. The only cereal I would consider worth buying would be decent muesli or porridge.

I am very selective - try and buy organic and stick to shredded wheat and weetabix type stuff. Anything that sounds too appetising is probably bad. I usually check the sugars per 100g on the label. Unfortunately, I don't seem to have much time for midweek cooked breakfasts anymore and the older dds like the independence of getting cereal for themselves.

In winter I cook porridge for me but dds don't like it, even with added fruit and maple syrup. DD1 likes the odd spoonful of mine, but is put off by a whol;e bowl full. Bah. What do your children eat for breakfast Bugsy2?

I make my own muesli, but it's too high-fibre for the kids.

The kids eat Whole Earth muesli, Whole Earth corn flakes, and organic rice crispies. All these are fine.

I don't think the fat in nuts is a problem, really, anyway. I'm more bothered by refined sugar and white carbs.

dull in our house too
muesli the dorset cereal ones are the only ones that taste edible IMO
proper oat porridge
weetbix
shreddies or the sheap equivalent

DD is on weetabix and DS is on readybrek which I wish he would get over. Would prefer him to have proper porridge.

The dorset ones are nice, aren't they.

I fell in love with Magoo muesli, but it was mind-bogglingly expensive, so I started making my own. Not much work and very tasty.

just love cereal - the choco pops, the cinniman toast one, - all the sugar ones. I love to munch them from the box. Very unhealthy but sooo yummy. At least there is iron, folic acid & vits - don't get these in biscuits.

C'mon then NQC - recipes for homemade muesli please as its just the sort of thing that i mean to do but never get round to (am Whole Earth swiss style groupie). It might be a good idea for me to make some as can cater to dd2's weird raisin aversion by using currants.

Here's the recipe I use, which FrannyandZooey gave me:

3 cups oats
1 cup wheatgerm
1/4 cup linseed
1/4 cup sesame seeds
1/4 cup sunflower seeds
4 tbsp ground almonds
1 tbsp barley malt
1 tbsp molasses (dissolve this and the barley malt in a little hot water otherwise it is too sticky)
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp ground cinnamon
2 cups raisins
Half cup dessicated coconut

Combine barley malt, molasses, oil, vanilla and cinnamon in a bowl. Mix all else except raisins and coconut in another bowl. Mix wet with dry. Stir well until all coated. Spread onto 2 baking trays and bake at 180 / gm 4 for 20 mins, stirring after 10 mins.
Add raisins and coconut and allow to cool. Place in airtight tin or jar in the fridge. Serve with milk as usual.

I use random dried fruit, not just raisins. And unless you really like coconut, you might want a bit less of that. Oh, and I add pumpkin seeds and random nuts (generally sliced almonds).

In a fan oven, you can just stick it all in a roasting tin and stir a bit. I tend to cook at a lower temperature for a bit longer. Oh, and I always make a double batch, but I eat a lot.

My mother made home made cereal for years after my father was told he had high cholesterol. We called it rubble! I like a mix of crunchy and Dorset cereals with yogurt and fruit. The children like it too, or weetabix/shreddies/ready brek. At the weekend we have Continental or American system breakfasts. I think it's a bit ridiculous to complain that nuts have a high fat content, as it all adds to the myth that all fat is bad. I like the cereal defender - seems to be saying that breakfast is entirely irrelevant and contributes nothing at all! I don't think that it takes much thinking to realise that most cereals contain a lot of sugar - they taste sweet for goodness sake!

The Oatmeal of the Alford porridge. The BEST!

readybrek is not proper porridge ?

Message withdrawn

But Lisalisa, "just organic" is still important to some of us! I buy a lot of organic stuff as it is grown in a sustainable way, with consideration to the environment. You're right, its still sugar and fat but slightly more conscience salving and (I beleive) better quality. The Whole Earth muesli is my favourite anyway (although I'm sure NQC/F&Z's will be once I've made it...)

Do like a nice poached egg though. And a smoothie.

Is it just me - or did that post sound pompous? OMG I'm turning into my father

Well, the rice crispies we have aren't whole earth, they're some other (American) brand. And they're brown rice, and a bit of sugar, iirc. No wheat at all, of course.

It's true that breakfast should include some protein, rather than just carbs, but brown carbs are at least better than white.

There is a wide range of non-mainstream cereals, some sugary, some not, some organic, some not, here

But if you want cheap unprocessed breakfast cereal, IMO there is nothing better than cooked brown rice with milk, banana and either cinnamon or vanilla, quinoa ditto, or good home made porridge.

even plain toasted conservation grade crushed oats sprinkled with a little OJ and baked , makes a fab crunchy cereal, keeps for a week or two
Our house would collapse without porridge

I think that it is a bit misleading to compare the fat in nuts with the fat in two fried eggs.
though nothing wrong with an egg at breakfast imo.
readybrek is foul stuff. we have porridge, weetabix, shreddies or cornflakes. dd1 likes cheerios (own brand equivalent) if she can get her hands on them but they are surprisingly sugary

Erm, are cornflakes and muesli acceptable, HC?

I hate these scare articles. so cocoa pops contain a lot of sugar? well slap me in the face with a soggy weetabix.

and as for the other stuff - like hc says - there's nowt wrong with eggs at breakfast and none of the fat levels they're talking about are dangerous in and of themselves. It's a bit silly really.

Christie - why not go for rice crispies instead of cocoa pops and bran flakes instead of all bran? I'm guessing that since they didn't mention it it contains less salt but it'll be on the packet. or porridge. you really can't beat porridge.