It took me nine days to find American-style breakfast cereal in a supermarket. It’s basically a cereal desert over here 🙂 But I have assembled four different flavors and assessed each one based on its texture/crunch, and flavor (on a 10-pt scale).
I should note that I couldn’t find any whole milk to most closely replicate the flavors at home, but this milk was still pretty tasty (.5%-1.5%….I guess the milk fat varies per bottle).
Now to the good stuff. First up Nestlé Honey Stars
Do you like to eat crispy dehydrated cardboard? Then these Honey Stars are for you. Must be why they were only $75NT when other boxes were more than twice as much. Hardly a trace of honey flavor. They have the hollow airy crunch of Honeycombs and I appreciate the silver foil bag they have inside, a’la Honey Smacks, but it can’t redeem this disaster. Nestlé, what are you doing?
Texture/crunch: 8
Flavor: 1.5
Next, we have Kelloggs Coco Balls
The first thing I noticed was that these did not turn my milk into quite the same level of chocolate milk as compared to Cocoa Puffs. The solid crunch held up well to a long soak, but the flavor just isn’t the same. Maybe they use different cocoa or sweeteners than I’m used to? I’m not going crazy for Coco Balls.
Texture/crunch: 7
Flavor: 4
Stepping to the plate, we have Kelloggs Corn Flakes
These might be the only indistinguishable facsimile I can find here. Same crunch, same boring flavor. I can add some slices of banana or strawberry and it will be solid. Not much to say, but at least you know what you’re getting.
Texture/crunch: 6
Flavor: 4
Last up is Kelloggs Frosties
These don’t have the visible sugared glaze on each flake like Frosted Flakes, which accounts for the more nuanced sweetness. I actually prefer these over their sweeter Western cousin. High marks for Frosties. They’re Grrreatt!
Texture/crunch: 7
Flavor: 7
Conclusion: Frosties is the clear winner. I would buy these at home. And if it weren’t so stupid, I’d cram some in my suitcase to take home (gotta leave room for whisky!). For now, I’ll finish off my last box and go back to the delicious breakfast scallion pancakes from the cart down the road.