How to extract just the cereal?

December 13, 2017 3:46 PM

Best practices for separating the remaining cereal from the dust that collects at the bottom of the bag?

You know how you hate it when you're pouring out that last bit, and forget to stop in time. The dusty bowl of breakfast cereal! How to avoid?

posted by Rash to Food & Drink (17 answers total)

Best answer: Colander?
posted by danceswithlight at 3:49 PM on December 13, 2017 [7 favorites]

Pour it into a wire mesh strainer?
posted by onecircleaday at 3:49 PM on December 13, 2017 [7 favorites]

Take the plastic liner out of the box and use your hands.
posted by acidic at 3:50 PM on December 13, 2017 [3 favorites]

I always just pour it through my fingers over the sink.
posted by LoveHam at 4:08 PM on December 13, 2017

Use the Brazil nut effect to your advantage: shake gently, then scoop from top, either with hand or cereal scooping utensil such as large spoon or feed scoop.
posted by SaltySalticid at 4:10 PM on December 13, 2017

Oooh... that's the good stuff added to the milk!
Anyway, pour it in the bowl, scoop into a second bowl with a spoon, leave what you don't want... you sure you don't want it? Toss the excess and rinse the extra bowl.
posted by TrishaU at 4:12 PM on December 13, 2017 [2 favorites]

I just take the plastic bag out of the cereal box and reach my hand in, pulling out the cereal pieces gently and guiding them into the bowl. Unless it's Cascadian Farms Graham Crunch... that crumbly stuff at the bottom is all the cane sugar I'd been denied in all of the previous bowls and it is so delicious!
posted by belau at 4:22 PM on December 13, 2017

Remove the bag from the box. Stab the bottom of the bag with a sharp knife a bunch of times. Grab the bag by the top while pretending you've just robbed a bank and are carrying out a sack with a giant dollar sign printed on it. Shake out the dust over the sink or trash can.
posted by carmicha at 4:26 PM on December 13, 2017 [9 favorites]

You take the bag out, hold it with one bottom corner facing down and shake so all the dust goes in that corner. Then you squeeze off that corner and twist it up a bit and pour the rest of the cereal out.
posted by zengargoyle at 5:25 PM on December 13, 2017 [4 favorites]

if i'm feeling frugal i cut a tiny hole in the bottom corner of the bag and let the dust dribble out but usually i just throw it all away like a capitalist pig
posted by poffin boffin at 7:20 PM on December 13, 2017 [6 favorites]

The secret is to distribute it evenly through the lifetime of the box, so a bit clings to full sized pieces and flavours the milk. This is done by storing the box upside down, righting it only to pour into your bowl.
posted by kellyblah at 7:33 PM on December 13, 2017 [5 favorites]

Best answer: I dump it through a colander; this works for all cereals I’ve tried it with. You can also do it with the dreaded Dusty Bowl of Cereal and pour the cereal from colander back into the bowl if you need to.
posted by epj at 8:21 PM on December 13, 2017

Slotted spoon?
posted by bunji at 11:48 PM on December 13, 2017

Best answer: When my mom used to eat Total every morning for most of my childhood, she would use a spider strainer to do this.
posted by gennessee at 2:35 AM on December 14, 2017 [1 favorite]

If you are going to roll into a new box of the same type of cereal, I open the new box when there's still about a serving left in the old box and pour the old cereal on top of the new. Shake and the dust settles to the bottom of the new box, but you still get the old flakes (or whatever) first so you're not getting overly stale.
posted by Kriesa at 6:15 AM on December 14, 2017

I dump everything into a large wire mesh strainer and then shake it over the sink. It at least gets the dust, although it doesn’t get the tiny chunks out.
posted by leahwrenn at 9:03 AM on December 14, 2017

Response by poster: I've now tested the colander down in the kitchen-laboratory and I'm happy with the result. That spider-strainer might even do a better job, I'll have to get one. A roommate had one of those years ago, but I never knew what they were called until now. Thanks for all the ideas!
posted by Rash at 3:01 PM on December 15, 2017