This one came about after I read a few articles on some frozen fruits and cherries. This slideshow from Men’s Health (that includes frozen blueberries as well!) and this article from Disease Proof seemed the most useful and relevant. They both suggested more cherries in your diet. And I remembered that I had some in my freezer, although it had been a while since I used them in anything. The Men’s Health page says that after six months frozen the cherries will have lost a decent amount of some of the nutritional benefits of cherries (polyphenols, but I can look into those more later. right now is smoothie time).

I can’t let any cherries of mine lose their nutritional value and go to waste. Just because I have a penchant for buying large quantity bags of frozen fruits from Sam’s Club doesn’t mean there is no rhyme or reason to it. I use them all up. It’s kind of amazing. So I decided that the next smoothie would most definitely contain some cherries. Plus they are just tasty, so why not?

After adding some yogurt, banana, juice, milk and strawberries to the mix, it was time to blend it all up. The result: a great smoothie with good ingredients that left me feeling amazing. It was a great, light, take-on-the-world type of smoothie. Now, if only I could bottle up that feeling and save it for later…

Ingredients:
1 vanilla yogurt cup (6 oz. or about 2/3 cup)
1/2 cup 100% apple juice
1/2 cup milk (whole, 1%, 2%, almond, coconut… whatever you like)
1/2 of a ripe banana (eat the rest as a snack later!)
1 cup frozen strawberries
1 cup frozen cherries

1. Add all of the ingredients into the blender in the order listed and blend on high until smooth.

2. Pour and enjoy!