CEREAL THINKING Creativity carries beyond breakfast

It may be good out of the box, but cereal holds its own secrets.
By RUSS LANE
KNIGHT RIDDER NEWSPAPERS
MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. -- Aside from pouring himself a large bowl of Cheerios for Saturday morning cartoons in his Richmond, Va., home, culture critic David Hoffman's cereal-laden childhood memories include a fondness for Alpha-Bits. Hoffman could turn a bowl of the wheat cereal into the breakfast equivalent of the Rosetta stone -- using the starchy letters to make words that wouldn't exactly be acceptable at any spelling bee.
Years later, Hoffman's interests as a writer lead him to write "The Easy Bake Oven Gourmet" (Running Press, $15.95); now his attention's turned toward "The Breakfast Cereal Gourmet" (Andrews McMeel, $14.95).
Noticing how chefs at nationally renowned restaurants such as Spago and David Burke & amp; Donatella were using breakfast cereals in their dishes, Hoffman created a book of renowned chefs and himself thinking outside the bowl and pouring sugary cereals into recipes such as Fried Green Tomatoes (using Kix) and Pan-Fried Ricotta Cakes with Shaved Prosciutto and Herb-Almond Oil (using Rice Krispies).Hoffman's own cereal experiments didn't always work out -- if you ever wondered, Golden Grahams don't work well in a sticky bun recipe. Although his book gives breakfast cereals a gourmet twist, using cereal in nontraditional manner is hardly anything new.
And it extends far beyond the now-common Rice Krispies treat. Every Thanksgiving I grew up with a sweet potato casserole that eschewed a marshmallow topping for Corn Flakes. The flakes caramelize with butter and brown sugar to form a crunchy hardened crust that buffers the mashed sweet potatoes' ultra-smoothness. And of the four dishes my mom can cook, this one always ranks as No. 1 each holiday season.
Steve Perrone of Perrone's on Pawleys Island, S.C., almost always uses crushed Cap'n Crunch for the scores of chicken fingers he cooks for his children.
"Not the one with Crunch Berries, before it all gets crazy, just Cap'n Crunch. There's no better coating for chicken fingers," Perrone said. "It's crunchy, it fries great, and it's got a sweet little touch to it."
Necessity is the mother
Perrone remembers his grandmother using Corn Flakes in a similar manner. Although Hoffman's book is focused on creativity, and adapting a childhood staple for modern tastes, Perrone thinks home cooks making atypical uses of cereals stems more from necessity than creativity.
"I remember way back when, there wasn't a supermarket on every corner," Perrone said. "Today you walk out the door and you can get anything a stone's throw from where you live."
In other words, if you didn't have flour on hand, you made do with what you had. And whether it's from creativity or necessity, Perrone and Hoffman agree that the results usually turn out better than traditional methods. The Cap'n Crunch can speak for itself.
Aside from the recipes, Hoffman created a book that not only features some highbrow recipes using cereals such as Corn Pops but also examines and applauds the odd space in pop culture that cereal commercials, marketing and figures populate.
"For me, it boils down to shared experiences of everyone's childhood," he said. "Cereal cuts across everyone's socioeconomic line." The fascination is such that makeshift museums of cereal characters appear throughout the country, September is considered National Cereal Month, and bids on cereal-related memorabilia on eBay can soar into hundreds of dollars.
These shared childhood experiences and the nostalgia and fun they spark are part of the reason people eat an average of 10 pounds of cereal (about 160 bowls) each year, Hoffman says.
What his book, and what home cooks and local chefs all do, is show how you can take something so common it's easy to overlook and make something memorable with it.
Fake out the French
Author David Hoffman lets us all in on a little secret. The French (self-proclaimed champions of all things edible) make a rich chocolate-espresso confection using very expensive wafers called gaufrettes. Cocoa Puffs are considerably less expensive, and they work better. Let them eat their gaufrettes!
Highly versatile, Corn Pops make an incredible nougat, almost like a peanut brittle given a Saturday-morning twist. Hoffman said his food stylist was worried about adding a sugary grain to traditionally sugarless recipes. But the results usually gave recipes only a subtle sweetness
Lending a faint sweetness and a pankolike crunch to whatever you pair it with, coarsely ground Cap'n Crunch makes a great breading for fried foods -- and Hoffman says food critics were shocked when the cereal was used as a stuffing for crab cakes.
Admit it. Of all the cereals along the aisles, Shredded Wheat looks the most grim. No matter how hard it is marketed to look appealing, it's the cereal equivalent of timeout. But shred the Shredded Wheat a little more and you have an interesting coating for fried shrimp and a texture you can use to give many recipes a jolt.