Despite being a 70-year-old brand, Cheerios seems to fit right in with America’s latest (ostensible) push to become slender and healthy. With low sugar and only 110 calories per serving, the cereal has always held a place on the “healthy” side of pre-packaged grocery items. But admirable nutrition stats do not a diet fad make, and the past few years have found Cheerios coming out with a plethora of new flavors to keep customers interested. The latest of these is an addition to their Multi Grain flavor: Multi Grain Cheerios Peanut Butter.

Notice the hourglass shape of the peanut butter color in the background. Subliminal messaging!

General Mills was kind enought to send me a free box of this new Cheerios variety for review purposes, even though they already seem to have a pretty established opinion of this cereal on their own website:

New! Multi Grain Cheerios Peanut Butter cereal. Indulge in real peanut butter taste without derailing your diet.

Okay, that seems pretty straightforward. Cheerios wants me to have all the joy of a little kid eating a peanut butter sandwich without all the misery and pounds that ultimately result from eating all those sandwiches. So how did they taste?

The verdict: not too bad! Eaten dry, this cereal was sweet, lightly crunchy and definitely had a distinct peanut butter flavor to it. With the multi-grain pieces, a spoonful was redolent of a peanut butter sandwich.

BUT notice the word choice: redolent. Meaning, it evoked a peanut butter sandwich. By no means will this cereal satisfy a craving for real, rich, decadent peanut butter. If you are on a serious diet, this cereal will get you by like a nicotine patch to a smoker. But if you are anything like drunk me and have zero self-control, you will take one look at that box and head straight for the bread and the peanut butter jar.

Paired with milk, this Cheerios Peanut Butter gets even better. The milk tones down the crunchiness and rounds out the sweetness, making for a truly enjoyable, if somewhat light, breakfast. But again, if you’re part of what is obviously the Cheerios dieting target demographic, a light breakfast is what you’re going for.

Multi Grain Cheerios Peanut Butter is a decently tasty and peanut buttery cereal, but in the end, it’s still just a bowl of healthy cereal and not a peanut butter sandwich. Based on this fact, and the lack of truly extraordinary innovation, I give them a 6.5 out of 10.

The dieters can keep dieting. As for me, I have other plans.

This guy knows what I’m talking about.

See that? That’s a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup.

As Quagmire from Family Guy would say: “Hehe…alllriiiight.”

One final note on product marketing. Be warned! The milk in the spoon does not splash up photogenically as seen in the picture on the box. It just kind of sits there.

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Sam

My name is Sam and all I care about is food.

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9 Responses

  1. Andy

    Kudos on the Chocula / Cheerio mash-up! Think of the unending possibilities of blending Cereals.
    Snack, Crackle, They’re Greeeeaaat!

    Reply
  2. Ethan

    I like how the final verdict is based on the fact that this is not a peanut butter sandwich. We should probably start rating other items similarly, regardless if it applies. Or makes sense.

    “You know, these wasabi and soy sauce almonds give a good taste of what it strives to achieve, but in the end, it still isn’t a full-course professionally prepared wasabi and soy sauce based meal. 5.7 out of 10”

    Reply
  3. Sam

    Ethan – great idea! Or even better: “You know, these wasabi and soy sauce almonds give a good taste of what it strives to achieve, but in the end, it still isn’t a peanut butter sandwich.”

    Reply
  4. Smokin'

    Maybe if I poured the cereal over a piece of Wonder Bread it would satisfy my peanut butter sandwich craving.

    Reply
  5. Dannette

    I LOVED this cereal. I don’t think I stuck to the serving size though…I had two bowls of it. I added it to that chocolate KRAVE cereal for the same peanut butter and chocolate rush.

    Reply
  7. Hunter-m3

    I really like these new PB Cheerios. I think they taste more like real PB then other leading cereal, such as PB Captin Crunch. I addition, I just want to say despite the advertising as a diet cereal, these actually have the same calories as PB Captin Crunch (although less sugar). However, there are severl alternative cereals viewed as bad with less calories, such as Fruit Loops, Waffel Crisp, Honey Comb, Cinnabon Cereal, and many more. So if actually on a diet be sure to check the labels and account for serving size.

    Reply
  8. Steph

    These are so good! Especially when you slice some bananas into them! Bummed that I haven’t been able to find them lately, hope they aren’t gone forever…

    Reply
  9. Alex

    Good review! I didn’t notice the hourglass shape on the cereal box, subliminal messaging indeed.

    @Steph Bananas sound like it would go great with this cereal. I haven’t tried this cereal yet but can’t wait.

    Reply

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