Thursday, March 29, 2012

Outside The Nutrition, Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey Cereal Is Not Extraordinary


The Good: Fairly nutritious, Tastes good, Affordable
The Bad: Not the most distinctive taste, Nothing superlative
The Basics: Kellogg’s Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal is good, but not superlative in any recognizable way.


With my new direction for food reviews – taking on reviewing breakfast cereals, which I began with Kellogg’s Fiber Plus Antioxidants Cinnamon Oat Crunch (here!) – I am going through the cupboards( and samples my wife has obtained) to create a useful guide to understanding the whole cereal aisle. After all, with so many choices, it is hard to know what is worth picking up. While I like Kellogg’s Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal, I know it will not be on the market indefinitely. Every few years, Kellogg’s tries to shake-up its cereal line-up by “franchising” its popular cereals. A few years ago, Special K was available with several different varieties of dried fruit. Now, there are one or two fruit Special Ks, but the rest seem focused on adding other things to the popular cereal.

Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal is a flake-based cereal which is sweeter than traditional Special K and also a little darker (the color of the physical flakes). And it is okay, but it is not exceptional in any way.

Basics

Kellogg’s Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal is a relatively new cereal with flakes of wheat, rice and corn. It looks like a very typical collection of flakes, most about 1/2” to 3/4” in two directions, thin and textured in its height. Special K cereal now comes in several different varieties, designed to give dieters more variety while they lose weight.

The standard box of Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal is 13.6 oz. That represents approximately thirteen servings and I was able to get a little over twelve servings out of both boxes my wife and I bought. In addition to having traditional flakes that have a light sheen from honey, MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal features a smattering of oats, some of which are stuck together in tiny colonies or that adhere to the flakes.

Ease Of Preparation

Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal is a breakfast cereal, so this is one of the low-impact breakfast options as far as preparation goes! Simply open the box of Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal, pour out 2/3 cup (I’ve taken to using a measuring cup) and add 1/2 cup of milk to it. I have discovered, as part of getting healthy, that one of the biggest challenges one might have with breakfast cereal is actually eating the serving size recommended by the manufacturer. Given that I have been monitoring my intake for several weeks now, I am now able to enjoy only 2/3 cup of Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal in a sitting, though it is not as filling as some other cereals I have had.

For the purposes of my reviews, and my regular consumption, I only use skim milk (fat free) milk with cereal.

Taste

Opening the box, Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey smells warm like honey in the sun. This is a very fresh, nicely invigorating aroma for a cereal and it creates an inviting atmosphere for the consumer.

On its own, the MultiGrain Oats & Honey is very dry and very sweet, compared to standard Special K. The sweetness is not overbearing and it accents the grains, as opposed to overwhelms them. I have noticed that without milk, the oats in the cereal are very flavorful, pushing a taste predictably like oatmeal that contributes to the dry flavor of the cereal.

With milk, the oat flavor is completely sublimated and the honey taste becomes more subtle. This makes the cereal much less forceful on the tongue and, I suspect, might appeal to more mature consumers who are not as into bold flavors. With milk, the flakes begin to get soggy after a few minutes and the flavor spreads more into the milk than the solid portions.

Nutrition

Kellogg’s Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal is exceptionally nutritious on its own and with skim milk! Made primarily of whole grain wheat,rice and sugar, there is nothing unpronounceable in Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal. Given that there is a separate listing of vitamins and minerals, I suspect that Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal is one of those cereals where the nutrients are then sprayed onto the cereal, making it important to drink the milk with this cereal in order to get all of the nutritional benefits out of it.

A single serving of Kellogg’s Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal is 29 grams, 2/3 cup. In that serving, there are 100 calories, with no calories coming from fat. There is no saturated fat in this cereal, nor is there any cholesterol. With only 140 mg of sodium and 3 grams of dietary fiber, this is a good dietary choice for those striving to improve heart. With two grams of protein and 70mg potassium, MultiGrain Oats & Honey is very healthy. On its own, this cereal has significant percentages of eight vitamins and minerals.

Storage/Cleanup

Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey is a cereal, so as long as it is kept sealed in its box, it ought to remain fresh for quite some time. The box of Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal we purchased on January 3, 2012 had an expiration date of November 23, 2012. Obviously, when you are done pouring the cereal from the box, fold down the plastic inner wrap to help maintain the cereal’s freshness.

Cleaning up after Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal is simple as well. Simply brush away crumbs left by it and you are done! It is that simple! This is a cereal that does not even discolor the milk added to it!

Overall

Special K MultiGrain Oats & Honey cereal is healthy, but not extraordinary in any real way. It is good, worth having, especially for those who do not like strong flavors, but it not one I eagerly recommend and not one I would stock up on.

For other components of breakfast, please be sure to check out my reviews of:
Kellogg’s Pumpkin Pie limited edition Pop Tarts
Dole 100% Juice Orange Peach Mango
Yoplait Parfait Grasshopper Pie Lowfat Yogurt

6.5/10

For other food reviews, please visit my Food Review Index Page for an organized listing of all the food reviews I have written!

© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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