When Post introduced the new Caramel Honey Bunches of Oats Just Bunches! cereal, I realized I no longer had a use for Sally (not her actual name, because I can’t pronounce her real name), the 8-year-old illegal immigrant Chinese girl I paid $1 a month to separate the bunches from my Honey Bunches of Oats cereal. Believe me it was worth the dollar to separate the flakes and the bunches in the cereal, because the bunches are the best part — they have all the flavor.

Some of you might be appalled by my blatant ignoring of child labor laws, but I will tell you that I treated Sally much better than she would have been treated in China. Not only did I pay her a dollar a month, I also let her eat all the Honey Bunches of Oats flakes she could eat, since I wasn’t eating them, but she had to provide her own milk, because I’m not a cow. I also taught her English by making her work in front of a television throughout the day. So far, she can say pretty well, “Survey says…” and “Come on down! You’re the next contestant on the Price is Right!”

When I showed Sally the box of Just Bunches! cereal and told her she was free to leave, she smiled and said, “cao ni zuzong shiba dai wonang fei” which at the time I thought it meant “thank you very much” in Chinese, but later found out that it really means, “Go fuck your ancestors to the eighteenth generation, loser.”

The Caramel Honey Bunches of Oats Just Bunches! cereal looks like I took a granola bar out of a hippie’s hands and beat them with it, causing the bar to break down into small pieces. The box it comes in is Grape Nuts-ish, which means it’s significantly smaller than most other cereal boxes because the cereal doesn’t take up much space, just like brains in the skulls of all contestants who are hoping to find love through a reality show. Because the bunches take up less space, I’m unable to determine what’s a good serving size without hauling out measuring cups. According to the box, there are eight 2/3 cup servings per box, but it took me four normal-to-me-sized bowls to eat all of it.

The cereal has a sticky, sweet smell and its caramel taste seemed very artificial, but neither of those were the most disturbing attributes of the Caramel Just Bunches! cereal. What was unsettling was its unnatural crunchiness after sitting in milk for ten minutes; its ability to turn skim milk brownish, a little thicker, and gross; and the use of a fucking exclamation point in its name. It’s a cereal, not a fucking energy drink.

As you can tell, I didn’t really care for the Caramel Honey Bunches of Oats Just Bunches! cereal, but there’s also a version with honey roasted bunches, just like the ones I paid Sally pick out, so maybe those will be better, but if not, I need to go find Sally and give her a 25 cent raise to encourage her to come back.

(Nutrition Facts – 2/3 cup – 250 calories, 7 grams of fat, 1 gram of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 2 grams of polyunsaturated fat, 3.5 grams of monounsaturated fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 90 milligrams of sodium, 135 milligrams of potassium, 43 grams of carbohydrates, 4 grams of dietary fiber, 14 grams of sugar, 25 grams of other carbohydrates, 5 grams of protein, a whole lot of vitamins and minerals, and one less illegal immigrant.)

(Editor’s Note: Thanks to TIB reader Jessica for recommending the Just Bunches! cereal. She now owes me protection from child labor laws.)

Item: Caramel Honey Bunches of Oats Just Bunches!
Price: $3.00 (on sale)
Size: 17 ounces
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 3 out of 10
Pros: Stays crunchy in milk. Vitamins and minerals. Monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fat. 4 grams of fiber. Paying someone a dollar per month to separate the bunches and the flakes in Honey Bunches of Oats cereal. Learning English through game shows.
Cons: Very artificial caramel flavor. Sticky, sweet smell. Turns milk gross. Enough in box for only four manly-sized bowls. Unnecessary use of an exclamation point in its name. Ignoring child labor laws.

I do not know if any of you noticed, but Honey Bunches of Oats is reproducing like rabbits and I bet people in China are pissed. While each couple in China can have only one child, an asexual semi-healthy cereal can have seven offspring, with the possibility of more. I bet you right now that Honey Bunches of Oats is off somewhere breeding. Its most recent spawn is the Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Chocolate Clusters.

With a plethora of Honey Bunches of Oats variations, I am wondering when it is going to stop popping out new flavors. Right now, there is Honey Bunches of Oats Honey Roasted, Honey Bunches of Oats with Almonds, Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Strawberries, Honey Bunches of Oats with Cinnamon Clusters, Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Peaches, Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Bananas, Honey Bunches of Oats with Vanilla Clusters and of course, Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Chocolate Clusters.

You know what? Maybe Honey Bunches of Oats is a polygamist and part of the Fundamentalist Crunchy Cereal Church and it lives with all of its Honey Bunches of Oats wives in a secluded ranch in the middle of Texas. Oh, the inbreeding could lead to some messed up offspring, like Honey Bunches of Oats with Bacon, Honey Bunches of Oats with Fluoride or Honey Bunches of Oats with Honey Bunches of Oats.

Anyway, I am exciting about Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Chocolate Clusters because it means we are one step closer to having Little Chocolate Donuts on our breakfast table. Fortunately, this cereal comes with real semi-sweet chocolate (with cocoa butter) and not that “chocolatey” crap, which looks good on the outside, but do a little digging and you’ll have a bitter taste in your mouth. Unless a bitter taste in your mouth is something you are into and willing to pay extra for.

Like I wrote in the previous paragraph, this cereal has semi-sweet chocolate, which makes sense because having sweet chocolate would be silly in a cereal that supposed to be healthy. Unfortunately, the semi-sweet chocolate clusters gives the cereal a really weak chocolate flavor and I was hoping that Barney Rubble would give me some his stolen Cocoa Pebbles to mix with this cereal.

Despite its weak chocolate flavor, I have to say that it is one of my favorite Honey Bunches of Oats variations. It has got the whole grain goodness for the adult in me, the chocolate goodness for the kid in me, and it allows me to buy a chocolate cereal that doesn’t make me look like a pathetic bachelor, puerile adult, or possible pedophile.

(Nutrition Facts – 3/4 cup – 120 calories, 2 grams of fat, 0 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 1 gram of monounsaturated fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 150 milligrams of sodium, 65 milligrams of potassium, 25 grams of carbs, 2 grams of dietary fiber, 7 grams of sugar, 16 grams of other carbs, 2 grams of protein, a whole lot of vitamins and minerals, and 1 step closer to getting mini Hershey’s Kisses into a cereal.)

Item: Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Chocolate Clusters
Price: $4.00 (on sale – 14.5 ounces)
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Real chocolate in it. Clusters are crunchy. Honey Bunches of Oats. One step closer to having Little Chocolate Donuts. Vitamins and minerals.
Cons: Chocolate didn’t stand out. My excessive use of “Honey Bunches of Oats” in this review (to kill some time, count the number of times I used it). Honey Bunches of Oats with Fluoride. Chocolatey crap.

Here at The Impulsive Buy we like to keep up with the latest product trends because we so desperately want to be cool and hip.

In our short existence, we have followed a few trends, like the breakfast smoothie trend and the low-carb soda trend. Another one we have been closely following is the cereal with real fruit trend, which we think is an awesome idea, but not as awesome as the Hypercolor clothing trend in the 1980s.

A few weeks ago we reviewed Corn Flakes With Bananas, which we found to be pretty damn good. Who would have thought adding bananas could make Corn Flakes, which is something just as bland as any Britney Spears’ CD, taste better?

So today we’re going to review another cereal with bananas, Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Bananas.

We at the Impulsive Buy are fans of the original Honey Bunches of Oats, with its crunchiness and lightly frosted corn and wheat flakes. After our kick-ass experience with Corn Flakes with Bananas, we assumed the Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Bananas would be just as good. Unfortunately, we were very disappointed.

To be honest, we were only dissatisfied with the dried bananas in the cereal. If we were able to pick out all the dried bananas, we would like it, but if we wanted that it would be easier to just buy a box of regular Honey Bunches of Oats.

The bananas in the Honey Bunches of Oats were soft and squishy, like Bob Dole without Viagra. So when we added the milk, the bananas absorbed it like a sponge and they got soggy faster than you can say, “These bananas suck ass.” This was unlike the Corn Flakes With Bananas, which had crunchy banana chips, like the kind you find in hippie health food stores in between the dried apricots and hemp bracelets.

These bananas in the Honey Bunches of Oats were so bad, we don’t think gorillas, monkeys, orangutans, or Robin Williams would like them.

After our positive experience with Corn Flakes with Bananas, we had such high hopes for Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Bananas. To summarize how we felt about this cereal, we would like to use the following analogy: It’s just like getting caught in the rain without an umbrella. Things get soggy and it sucks.

Item: Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Bananas
Purchase Price: $3.00 (on sale)
Rating: 2 out of 5
Pros: The Honey Bunches of Oats part.
Cons: The soggy bananas part.