Over the summer I learned to pop amaranth from Ashley at the edible perspective. It takes a while to get the hang of, and unless you’re some sort of popping natural you end up burning a few batches. If you get it right, though, the amaranth puffs into tiny little popcorn-esque babies that make a really fluffy bowl of cereal. I hadn’t done it since moving back from Owego and was a little rusty (I may have completely cremated the first batch) but it didn’t take too long to got back into the groove. And now I have this jar of little puffs!
This morning I built myself a bowl of cereal. I started with about a cup of my puffies, a teaspoon of unsweetened coconut, grated nutmeg and some raisins.
Then I added blobs of sunflower seed butter and that honey pretzel peanut butter…
And finally a few cinnamon Puffins, some granola, and milk.
My next goal in the cereal realm is homemade bran flakes! I actually really love bran flakes…. Strangely enough, they may be my favorite cereal. Something about they way they soak up milk– they hold texture even when they become soft. If I try it, you’ll be the first to know!
So now, a weighty and significant discussion topic: what’s your favorite cereal and why?
runandyum 
Oh! I want to learn how to pop amaranth. Can I come over sometime and try it out? They had it in candy and snack bars in Peru; it was great.
My favorite cereal is Grape-Nuts, or John’s homemade granola, or a combination of the two.
Of course!! I may have to practice again first… Otherwise it might just be watching me try not to burn amaranth. Which I suppose could still be valuable, but possibly more time consuming and with more need for airing out the room. I’d love to try to bake it into granola bars!
I remember when I discovered the Grape Nuts are yummy… But it’s been forever since I’ve had them. I bet a Grape Nut and amaranth bar would be delicious. Possibly with almonds, raisins, and dried apricots?
Peanut-butter capt’n crunch. This is a silly favorite cereal to have. It should be organic homemade granola, or at least peanut butter bumpers or some sort of natural capt’n crunch knock-off, but no, they are inferior.
There is no ‘should’ in favorite cereal, and peanut butter is never silly 🙂
Rosie, have you ever tried Reese’s Peanut Butter Puffs?
My favorite cereal is Anna’s homemade granola… 🙂 I actually don’t know what my favorite cereal is right now! I buy cereal so infrequently that it’s usually whatever hippie-crunch is on sale at the Grocery Outlet, haha. But when I was a kid, man, I loved Quaker Oat Squares. And Smacks. And Reese’s Peanut Butter Puffs, but those were only for beach week.
There was a period of middle school where I ate nothing but Quaker Oat Squares for breakfast. And Reeses Peanut Butter Puffs were my “healthy” dessert at the Great Room 🙂 (I don’t remember much about Smacks except the weird-looking frog(?) mascot.)
I do like reeses puffs. We didn’t ever get them but once mom was being really nice and we bought a box and had a picnic breakfast at the zoo. The gibbons were jelous of our reeses puffs.
By the way, can the same popping method be applied to quinoa?
I haven’t tried quinoa, but I’ve heard it is really hard to do yourself. I wish that wasn’t true though, because I’ve bought it from the store before and it’s delicious!!
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