We're not just extruding dough here, like you do when you're making pasta, or even like commercial pasta makers do when they're making pasta, but in the cereal-making process, the extrusion is also the cooking process, which means that once the cereals are finished and packaged up, they are truly ready to eat. ![]() Now what's interesting to note here is that the whole point of this process is to end up with a product that is ready to eat. I haven't been able to verify this, though – if I find a source that will tell me conclusively or if General Mills will return my phone calls, I'll update this information.) However, sprayed on vitamins tend to taste horrible and can wash off in milk, so since original Cheerios doesn't have a sugar coating of any kind and has no bitter taste, I actually suspect that they use a type of heat-stable synthetic vitamins that can be added earlier. (Side note: This is the standard procedure for fortifying extruded cereals with vitamins. Thus, the vitamins are sprayed on at the end of the processing. Most vitamins, whether natural or synthetic, are sensitive little creatures and will denature if added before the extrusion process due to the excessive heat. Synthetic vitamins are then sprayed on the cereal. Or should I say, “lightly toasted,” as the lovely lady at Nature's Path described it when I called their offices… The paste is then pushed out of the chamber through a die, which is how the recognizable “O” shape is formed, then cut and dried. This gelatinizes the proteins in the flour, which softens and binds the dough. To make Cheerios, the flour is steamed inside a high-pressure chamber. It's all dry grains and starches (plus synthetic vitamins and preservatives)! What's especially interesting to me is that if you look at the list of ingredients on a box of Cheerios, there's not a single “wet” ingredient. How Cheerios Are Made (and why most store-bought cereals are detrimental to your health) So, let's first take a look at how store-bought Cheerios are made so we can better understand the ingredients in homemade Cheerios. Others believe, however, that there is still at least one GMO ingredient lurking in the cereal.Īll this to say, you can make Cheerios at home! Other ingredients in Cheerios also come from genetically modified organisms, most notably the corn starch and the sugar, which actually changed just at the beginning of this year, when General Mills announced that Cheerios is now GMO free.Cheerios, like most store-bought cereals, use synthetic vitamins and preservatives, some of which are potentially derived from GMO sources.Despite using whole grains, the enzymes in the grains that make whole grains healthy (and digestible) are largely denatured during the manufacturing process due to excessive heat and pressure.Problem is, those lovely O's can be both unhealthy and expensive: There are even books written specifically to use Cheerios as a teaching tool ( we loved this one when our oldest was a toddler) and coffee table books written that include Cheerios' role in American health and pop culture ( this one is especially intriguing). ![]() They are, after all, a pantry staple for many parents since they're perfect finger food, easy to toss in the diaper bag, and they don't stain the carpet if spilled. The spot ends with her pouring a bunch of Cheerios on the chest of her sleeping father - believing it will make his heart healthier.Įven in an era when the nation's African-American president is in his second term in office and with minorities soon to become a majority population, much of the social media response to the mixed-race ad has been poisonous, leaving some wondering what kind of reality such Internet response actually reflects.Use our step-by-step method to take charge of your life so you have time for what *really* matters. In the ad, she is seeking nutritional advice from her white mother and black father. ![]() Social media blow-back has been fierce, nasty and unusually racist after the top-selling, General Mills cereal brand last week began airing - and then posted online - a commercial featuring a sweet, mixed-race girl. General Mills disabled YouTube comments because of some ugly responsesĬheerios - a consumer brand perhaps least-likely to be embroiled in a racially tinged controversy - has found itself in just that.Nasty social media response was almost instantaneous.The mixed-race ad began airing last week.
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