Cereal Killer

We're all guilty of noshing down bowl after bowl of cold cereal, or, why use a bowl, just take in an entire box of some food like product marketed to be a complete meal, eating 4 - 5 times the serving size on some carb fueled sugar craving.   Breakfast cereal is marketed as being a healthy substitute for real food in our ever increasing frenzy of lives.  But it's not.  Cold cereal is about as healthy at a donut!  But it's tasty!  There are few things in the world as comforting than a bowl of crunchy sweetness in milk before bed.  It makes us feel like kids, it makes us feel comforted (isn't that the point of comfort food?).  And what about those mornings where you wake up a half hour late and are rushing to get out of the door on time and you just want to get in a quick nutritious something before you race through your day?  We are deluding ourselves thinking that store bought cereal is a good option. 

Store bought cereal is laden with chemicals and hidden sugars.  Even organic cereals are horrible for you.  It's a ruse to convince you that you are being healthy.  In essence, you've picked the lesser of two evils.  In order to make commercially prepared cereals they process the grains until they are literally liquified.  Not belnded, not slurried, liquified.  They break the very molecules of the grain down into mush.  Then they shape them into puffs and rings and flakes and crunchy little balls of deception!  This process often renders the grains themselves toxic and allergenic.  What are we doing to our food?  More importantly, what are we doing to ourselves? 

Well, Mrs. Smarty Pants, how are we supposed to eat cereal for breakfast with out buying into the processed food trap?  Good question.  Make it yourself.  WHAT!?!  Really!  It's actually not that hard.  It will take some finesse, some patience, and some ingenuity to get your cereal exactly to your tastes, but you can do it.  As a matter of fact, we made cereal this past weekend.  Yup.  We made cereal and we killed that mess (Hence why were cereal killers. wokka wokka)!  It took the same amount of time as it took me to make dinner for 3.  How do I know that for sure?  Because I made them at the same time.  It didn't even take extra time in the kitchen.  We had spaghetti with garden vegetable sautee and homemade tomato sauce.  It takes me about 40 minutes to make.  Including cook time, that's how long it took to make cereal!

Now in all fairness, this recipe started out as one thing, then after raiding my cupboards I realized I had minimal amounts of the ingredients, so we modified on the fly.  The version I made (I'll include both recipes) isn't horrible at all, just unique.  It's pretty tasty, but I think I will try it the other way next time (a serious trip to the market is in order) and compare.  But The girls love this cereal.  They say it tastes better because they got to make it!  This is a base cereal.  You can add fruit, nuts, honey or syrup, raisins, whatever you want to your bowl when you eat it.  It's better that way!  So this is our modified bare cupboards recipe and a photo tutorial.  At the end I will post our original recipe (which is modified from the suggestions of 3 separate recipes I found on line).  You make it the same way, just different ingredients.


Crunchy Homestead Honey Flakes (Our oldest picked the name)

1/2 C      finely ground white corn meal
1 1/2 C   whole wheat flour
3/8 C      Organic sugar free Peanut Butter
2 t          ground cinnamon
1/8 t       nutmeg
1/8 t       ginger
3T         raw local honey
1/2 C     whey (from making cheese)
1/4 C     H20 (may not use all of the water)
1t          Pure vanilla extract

1.  Preheat oven to 300 degrees.   Put all of the ingredients except for honey, water, whey, and vanilla into food processor.

2. Mix the ingredients, scraping down the bowl occasionally, until well blended

3.   Mix honey and vanilla into whey and our into food processor and blend, scraping bowl occasionally, until well blended.

 4.  Add additional water, 2 T at a time, pulsing between additions, until dough is not sticky but holds together.  Divide into 2 balls.

 

 5.   Place one ball onto parchment paper and roll FLAT as possible.  1/8" or thinner.  (we didn't get ours quite thin enough).  Move thin rolled dough to cookie sheet dusted with corn meal (next time I will just use two sheets of parchment paper.  Seems easier).

6.   Roll our second ball of dough the same as above (we decided to make it in two different thicknesses to see which we prefer, so we rolled our second ball out to about 1/4" and scored it with a pastry cutter for easy break lines when done).

7.  Place sheets of cereal in oven (I left the second sheet on the parchment and baked it directly on that, no cookie sheet) and set timer for 20 - 25 minutes (I know the timer says 30 minutes, but that was too much for the thin sheet and it got slightly burned on the edges.  20 - 25 would have been much better.  Consequently, 30 mins was not long enough for the thick sheet and it needed an additional 5 minutes.)

8.  Pull the sheets of cereal out of the oven when they are slightly bubbly and a golden brown.  They won't crisp up all the way until cooled.  This is a gamble, our thicker ones did not get cooked long enough and some of the middle stayed soft.  Our big girl says that makes them chewy and delicious.  LOL!

9.  Let cool entirely then Break squares apart (if you did the thicker ones) or break sheet into flakes (note on the thin ones the edges lifting up and becoming flake like).  Put your cereal  into atorage containers (an old jelly jar and demarara sugar container worked here (I save that sort of thing.... never know when it will come in handy! *says the pack rat*).

10.   Eat and enjoy!

So There you go.  Our modified modified version of homemade breakfast cereal.  It's actually very tasty with a unique hearty type flavor.  I do not think I will use cornmeal next time though.  It gives it an odd almost gritty texture, not bad, just ....odd.  I am thinking about graham flour in place.  And hopefully I will have all the tasty stuff to make it in our original version.....  Here is the original recipe.....



Matanily Love-made Breakfast Flakes (Baby Booter named this one...lol)

1/2 C      Nuts (your choice) divided in half
1/2 C      Graham flour
1 1/2 C   Whole Wheat Flour
3 T         Raw local honey
1/2 t       Salt
1t           Cinnamon
1 T        Coconut Oil
1 t         pure vanilla extract
1/2 C     Whey
1/4 C     H20

Preheat to 350    

Grind half of the nuts in food processor until powdered
Add in all other ingredients except for honey, water, whey, and vanilla.  Mix until well blended, scraping bowl occasionally. 
Dissolve honey and vanilla into whey  and add to ingredients in food processor.  Mix until well blended. 
Add water 2 Tbs at a time, blending between additions, until dough holds together with out being sticky.
Divide dough into 2 balls.
Roll out on parchment as thin as possible (at least 1/8").
Place in oven and bake 20-30 mins until golden brown.
Let cool entirely and break into bite sized flakes.

Store in air tight container until ready to eat.


So there you go.  Delicious tasty healthy homemade cold breakfast cereal.  I was amazed (just like the Cheese) at how easy this actually was.  We enjoyed making this together (well me and my Big girl, Baby Booter was not feeling very well.).  I hope you guys have as much fun making and eating this as we did.  I think it's pretty tasty.  Cassie thinks it's delicious!  :)

My challenge, to you, today, is to make some cereal!  Find a way to make it with what you have.  It's a great way to get excited about that most important meal of the day thing we're doing (right?).  Accessorize it or eat it as is in all of it's nutty wholesome healthy goodness.  You won't be disappointed.  It's really quite satisfying to know that you can provide this for your family.  Make them even healthier, unprocess even those quick breakfasts that seem all too familiar, impossible to go all natural, and happen all too frequently.  Go make goodness happen!  You know you wanna be a cereal killer too.  ;-)

Today I hope you find humor.  Laughter is the most important ingredient to our happiness.