Enjoy Life Foods Cereal Product Review

Two of my all time favorite cereals since being on the gluten-free diet have been Perky’s Crunchy Flax and Perky’s Crunchy Rice, which are now part of the Enjoy Life family of foods that are not only gluten-free, but are also free of the 8 most common food allergens! I recently received a complimentary box of each cereal from Enjoy Life Foods to review for you on my blog.

Prior to my celiac diagnosis, one of my favorite things to eat for breakfast was a bowl of Grape Nuts and that was one of the foods I missed most after my diagnosis. The Crunchy Flax and Crunchy Rice cereals by Enjoy Life Foods remind me (if only the nature of them) of Grape Nuts. They do not taste like Grape Nuts but they do have that nutty flavor and crispy crunch. With a bowl of Grape Nuts (depending on your taste preferences), I can see how some people might need to add sugar in order to make the cereal palatable but I always liked mine plain or if I was in the mood for a sweeter cereal, I would add sliced banana. With the Crunchy Flax and Crunchy Rice cereals, there is a slight sweetness to them, but it comes from raisin juice concentrate and honey which I think is a better alternative to granulated sugar anyway.

Check out the nutritional information on the Crunchy Flax cereal:

A 3/4 cup serving of Crunchy Flax cereal provides a whopping 15% of your recommended daily intake of iron, which is a very good thing for a lot of celiacs who battle anemia due to malabsorption issues. I seriously cannot recall ever seeing another boxed cereal with this much iron. If you battle high iron levels though, like with Hemochromatosis*, this may not a good choice, but the Crunchy Rice cereal is lower in iron than the Crunchy Flax. (*There is a brief mention of Hemochromatosis in relation to celiac disease in the current issue (February/March 2010) of Living Without Magazine in an article titled, “Iron Works.” Sam has a schoolmate whose mom has it, so we have talked about her experience living with the disease. It is exhausting what she has to go through to stay healthy: blood letting every few weeks to reduce the iron in her blood. She has not been diagnosed with celiac but she is on the gluten-free diet). There are also six grams of fiber per serving which really helps you get closer to the 20 – 35 grams of daily recommended fiber!

Nutritional information for the Crunchy Rice cereal:

They both only have 5 ingredients and 5 grams of sugar per serving. No artificial colorings, artificial flavorings or preservatives! I personally love both of these cereals and I have even made a new yummy cereal bar with the Crunchy Flax, which I will post on a separate page.