The Best Cherries

As I write this, stone fruit season is a far way off.

However, that doesn’t mean I’m not thinking of stone fruits, like cherries. And not necessarily because I’m a cherry fanatic.

No, part of the reason I’m thinking of stone fruits is for your sake. It sounds odd, I get it, but as I’ve mentioned time and time again, food is medicine. I believe God intended for many sources of medicine to come from that which grows in the ground.

Which is why I wanted to talk to you about one of the best kinds of cherries around.

Don’t get me wrong; all cherries are good. But as you’re used to hearing me say, some forms of “medicine” are better than others, and when it comes to delivering high-quality antioxidants as well as healing power, the tart cherry is one of the best.

I know, don’t tell the other kinds of cherries, they may be bruised by this fact.

The tart cherry is one of the few cherries that you’ll see listed online as a supplement and the only kind of cherry we offer patients in a therapeutic setting.

And now that I’ve amped up the drama around this fruit, it’s about time I tell you what benefits the tart cherry provides you with.

Amazing Benefits of Tart Cherry Juice

There’s really no reason to dance around the issue, tart cherry is exactly as it sounds… a tart, TART cherry.

These kinds of cherries are really only appealing to those who enjoy something with a bit of acid and zing in their food.

If you’re a fan of sweet, dark cherries, you won’t like eating a tart cherry.

But you may enjoy drinking the juice or taking a capsule filled with its extract, and here’s why.

1 - Helps Support Inflammatory Response: 

If you ever worry about what too much inflammation can do to you (and you should) then you’ll be happy to know that Tart Cherry juice and extracts help to support healthy responses to inflammation which offer a major benefit to supporting great health.

Tart cherries are filled with antioxidants and phytonutrients that are supremely useful for modulating how inflammation affects our bodies.

The specific compounds they contain are helpful at blocking COX-1 and COX-2 enzymes. This is incredibly important for helping you deal with the negative effects of inflammation in the body.

But you might wonder what that means for you in a normal setting?

Well for some people the ability of tart cherry to modify how COX-1 and COX-2 enzymes interact with tissue actually leaves them feeling better throughout their body; specifically it can reduce muscle soreness so that after intense exercise your muscles don’t feel the full impact of the beating they underwent.

In a randomized controlled trial researchers discovered that consuming tart cherry juice twice daily substantially improved muscle soreness related to exercise. 

In the same study, the exercise-induced loss of strength over the four days following a workout was reduced from 22% to only 4%.

As a former collegiate athlete who never got time off during the season I wish I would have known about this almost miraculous attribute of tart cherry as it would have helped me deal with pain in a much healthier way than most athletes do.

I realize that not everyone reading this cares about reduced muscle soreness, which is why I ought to mention the other ways tart cherries can help to maintain a healthy response to inflammation.

Studies indicate that by helping out with inflammation it can lead to improvements in blood pressure as well cholesterol levels. This has huge impacts on cardiovascular health as well immune health.

2 - It May Help With Sleep:

Sleep, and good sleep at that, is foundational for great health.

Tart cherries have been shown to help solve periods of time where you can’t get good sleep.

The way they work to solve occasional sleep issues is by delivering one of nature’s most powerful hormones (and antioxidants), which is melatonin.

Melatonin helps to establish circadian rhythm so that you’re able to fall asleep, naturally.

At 13mg of melatonin per 1g of tart cherry, the truth is tart cherries are one of the world’s most potent sources of melatonin.

On top of that some of the proanthocyanidins (nutritive antioxidant compounds) have been shown to  increase the availability of tryptophan, which is needed for your body to produce serotonin. And serotonin is an essential neurotransmitter that encourages sleep.

Plus, tart cherries can even help to prevent an enzyme called indoleamine 2,3 dioxygenase from decreasing tryptophan’s ability to produce serotonin.

Studies clearly indicate tart cherry is helpful for sleep. A study published by the European of Nutrition said this about tart cherry juice and sleep.

“In a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled, crossover design, 20 volunteers consumed either a placebo or tart cherry juice concentrate for 7 days. [the] data suggest that consumption of a tart cherry juice concentrate provides an increase in exogenous melatonin that is beneficial in improving sleep duration and quality in healthy men and women and might be of benefit in managing disturbed sleep.”

And Guess What, Tart Cherry Juice Is Available In a Pill!

A lot of people know tart cherry juice is good for them, but don’t want to drink it because it’s super sour.

The good news is you can take tart cherry juice in an incredibly potent form via a tiny easy-to-swallow capsule.

All of those benefits you just just read about can be provided via a capsule. 

You can get your bottles here.