Cooking For Dummies

C E R E A L

Ingredients

Bowl

Spoon

Milk

Cereal

Instructions

Place bowl flat on table or other sturdy piece of furniture. If you can't find a stable piece of furniture, you may hold the bowl in one hand while preparing with the other, although this is a rather advanced technique. Do not attempt unless supervised by a professional.

Once bowl is placed on table or in hand, pour in cereal. Make sure you don't completely fill the bowl, or it will overflow later once we add the milk. A good rule of thumb is to only fill the bowl about 2/3rds of the way up, but this is by no means the only method available.

Next, add the milk, pouring slowly and evenly over the cereal. Sometimes milk jugs are impractical for this, so feel free to first pour the milk into a cup, then a larger cup, then a series of small cups, and THEN the cereal bowl. Fill no higher than half of an inch from the top.

Next, grasp the spoon firmly (don't clench!) and pat the cereal, submerging it underneath the milk to moisten all of the cereal. Picture the bowl as a clock: Start at 11:45 (AM, not PM) and continue in a clockwise motion, making another pat every "15 minutes" or so.

Once your cereal is thoroughly saturated, it is ready to enjoy.

Troubleshooting

I poured the milk in BEFORE the cereal! What do I do?

The most important thing is DON'T PANIC! Use a funnel and pour the milk BACK into the milk jug. Then, wash the bowl thoroughly, wipe dry, and start from the beginning.

There's milk all over my table! What happened?

First, check your bowl and make sure it's not a plate or a sieve. Next, make sure you poured the milk INTO the bowl and not NEXT to the bowl. If this doesn't solve your problem, contact our help desk at 1-800-555-BOWL.

I followed the recipe, but the cereal tastes bad!

Check the box. Are you sure it's cereal? You might be using pancake mix, or possibly nails.

I've heard about this cereal thing... is it easy to make?

It's not HORRIBLY difficult, but if you're a novice chef, you might want to start with easier dishes that incorporate some of the same ingredients, such as "handfuls of cereal" or "bowl of potato chips."

Once you master these, try a couple dry runs with cereal. pour in the cereal, but skip the milk.

Once you've mastered cereal, you can move onto a more advanced recipe: "Second bowl of cereal."