No tomatoes, please

The other day I was at the local Teeter looking for some sort of fruit because my body is going into some sort of nutrient withdrawal because I eat Alpine every day. I think in modern science that is called death. But anyway, I was looking at some grapes and hark! I saw, right there before me, the plastic bags of dark burgundy, huge, ripe cherries. And they were on sale! It was an exciting moment for me, which I guess confused the produce guy who was taking them off the display for the night and who was apparently a little uncomfortable with my enthusiasm.

But anyone could understand my enthusiasm about cherries. In the vast pantheon of fruit, cherries stand way above most of the rest. The luscious, dark, wonderfully juicy little fruit has such a delicate flavor reminiscent of the sweetest of plums that doesn’t even vaguely resemble the fake cherry flavor of the medicines of our childhood or, worse, those insipidly neon maraschino cherries. They are, in fact, in the same family as plums, peaches and other fleshy fruits wrapped around large pits, and it’s no small wonder that those are among the most awesome fruits ever, let’s be honest.

It’s still amazing to me that I never tasted a fresh cherry until about a year ago. And I’m so glad that they don’t taste anything like anything “cherry flavored.” Because, let’s be honest, of all of the terrible approximations of fruit flavors, cherry is definitely the worst. Though none actually taste anything like the fruit they’re supposed to be resembling, grape is generally passable and orange is always yummy somehow. But cherry is never good. I mean, the red popsicles are always the last ones you go for, and cherry triaminic is so the worst (besides the yellow, I mean, what flavor is that even supposed to be?) On a weird side note, orange Triaminic is The. Best. Shit. Ever. Like, my mouth is watering just thinking about it. I’ve always hope to find orange soda that tasted as yummy as the orange medicine, but no dice.

There are tons of varieties of cherries, but only a few are sold widely in America. There are pretty much either the dark red to burgundy bing cherries, or those yellow/pink-ish red Rainier cherries which are way more expensive. There are also sour cherries, but those are used mostly for cooking. Most cherry cultivation takes place in the US in Washington and Oregon and the Pacific Northwest, so, not so eco-friendly, but whatever, Barbara Kingsolver can suck it, they’re awesome.

Also, I don’t think I’ve ever had anything with cooked cherries in it, but I feel like they pobably lose a lot of their magic when subjected to heat and pie and other ingredients to taint their natural splendor. But, ya know, if you want cherry pie, I’m sure there’s a great recipe out there. Here’s a good-looking recipe for cherry upside-down cake from the ridic blog Smitten Kitchen which is lovely and well-written and totes makes me jealous.

Also, cherries totally make you poop! They also have like, antioxidants or some other crap. So there, so many good reasons to love cherries.

Related:

Cherry Information

Smitten Kitchen