Over the years, I’ve gone back and tried different cereals I either enjoyed as a kid or wanted to try back then, but was shot down.

My mother was a big believer in plain, unsweetened puffed wheat, puffed rice, and other things that still bring an unwanted shiver. A culinary genius she was not, and her aversion to cereal that changed the color of the milk was not because of a health concern. She was just cheap. Don’t even get me started on her attempts at pancakes and such.

It’s not for nothing that I thought the food in basic training was manna from heaven.

Anyway, here’s how the cereals I’ve tried over the years have stacked up.

Fruity pebbles were unedible mush. If this was what cavemen really ate, we would never have gotten out of the cave.

Captain Crunch, with crunchberries of course, hurt to eat and just tasted weird. The three coats of varnish they carry really put a fine point on the captain’s hat.

Peanut Butter Crunch also hurt, but was only slightly weird. Not good, but not as bad.

Cheerios, Chex, and Kix were all right, but there’s only so much you can do with dried grain paste, honey, and preservatives.

Count Chocula, on the other hand, is quite nice. I popped open a box I bought the other day and had some for lunch. The little bits of cereal had some short of shellac on them, so they stayed crunchy for as long as I took to empty the bowl. They had no real sharp edges, so I’m not bleeding from my snack. The little marshmallows softened a tad, but didn’t turn to mush. The milk turned to a mildly weak chocolate milk, which was nice to finish off when the cereal and marshmallows were gone.

Prepubescent me enjoyed them while sitting in my friend Shane’s kitchen watching anvils be dropped upon the deserving. Late middle-aged me is going to break out the Looney Tunes DVD’s next time I have a bowl and get the complete experience.

Was it good for me? No, absolutely not. The only nutrition in this ‘food’ was sprayed on at the factory. Any connection to actual food is because Count Chocula is third cousin, twice removed, from the Iowa State Corn Princess. And I don’t even want to think about how much sugar I just ingested.

But it tasted good, was rather pleasant to eat, and was exactly how I remember it tasting the few times I would get a bowl while staying at a friend’s house way back when.

I’ll crack open the boxes of BooBerry and FrankenBerry and we’ll see how they stack up.