frosted sugar bombs

When I was growing up, we didn't get to eat "sugar cereal". I rebelled against this at every chance I could get. At one sleepover, Lucky Charms became my favorite cereal; at another I learned the trick of sprinkling sugar on my plain Cheerios. In college - the enticement to drink too much alcohol on Greek Row was nothing compared to the cafeteria's addictive assortment of Frosted Flakes, Fruit Loops, Cocoa Puffs, Super Golden Crisp, Lucky Charms and Cinnamon Toast Crunch!

Nowadays, we buy the knock-off Malt-O-Meal bagged cereal because it's cheaper. We got in the habit of eating cold cereal every morning this summer and now that it's fall, we're getting back to cooking oatmeal. By comparison, it's pretty bland, and I'm being careful about how much sugar I add. This prompted me to look at just how much sugar is in the cereal we've been eating and I was surprised, to say the least. I love Frosted Mini Spooners, affectionately referred to as "heroin wheats" by my uncle, and I expected the sugar coated cereal to be at the top of the list for sugar content. This favorite weighs in with 11g of sugar per 55 gram serving. That's 20% sugar, which actually isn't too bad if you compare them to the following:

Honey Nut Scooters (10g/30g) 30% sugar
Cinnamon Toasters (10g/30g) 30% sugar
Frosted Flakes: (12g/31g) 39% sugar
Raisin Bran (29g/59g) 40% sugar
Marshmallow Mateys (13g/30g) 43% sugar
Tootie Frooties (15g/32g) 47% sugar
Coco Roos (15g/30g) 50% sugar
Golden Puffs (15g/27g) 56% sugar!

Just think about that! 56% sugar? Over half the weight of the bag is sugar?! And I'm paying how much for this? More than the price of a 4 pound bag of sugar, I'm sure. So, I'm afraid that I must admit that my mother was right on this one. If we buy any more bagged cereal, it's going to have to be one of the following, or the generic equivalent of:

Original Malt-O-Meal (0g/35g) NO sugar
Creamy Hot Wheat (0g/35g) NO sugar
Moms Best Oatmeal (<1g/40g)

My penny-pinching side says: these cereals are the same price, and cheaper than the ones loaded with sugar, so I can buy these and add my own sugar (like I did with the Cheerios years ago) to get the same thing, only cheaper. My health conscious side says that dumping white sugar on your cereal is not good for you. Honey, fresh fruit, dried fruit, or other more natural sweeteners would be much healthier, and is still probably cheaper. My slightly crunchy side is telling me to buy my oats and wheat in bulk from a local food co-op and make my own cereal. (And now my engineering side is ready to sit down and run some more numbers.) Nevertheless, I'm going to have to keep around some Frosted Mini Spooners for Sundays...I can't be a TOTAL scrooge. After all, if I never offer "sugar cereal" to my kids, they might fall off the wagon when they discover it for themselves someday.