Red Means Go- Tart Cherries and Muscle Recovery

Spring is in the air! It seems like everywhere we look, people are outside, cleaning up yards, exercising, and enjoying a little warm weather. With new years resolutions and warmer weather for jogging, more people are hitting the gyms and sweating up a fever. Only to wake up the next morning with tired and aching muscles that don’t want to move an inch. And this isn’t limited to the sporty kind of people, spring cleaners using up a bit too much of their elbow grease can also come down with a case of sore muscles.

It’s good to take care and not push yourself too hard, but sometimes muscle soreness is unavoidable. Pain relief gel or a cbd roll on might work in these instances to help facilitate muscle recovery, as would simply taking a day of rest. But if only there was a delicious remedy that you could eat, perhaps even as part of your workout routine or as a reward for clearing out the house.

Well, now there is! The Cherry Marketing Institute has put together a fabulous resource page about the muscle recovery benefits of tart cherries. That page can be found here.

Make sure you scroll to the middle of the webpage and download the Tart Cherry Recovery Recipes booklet. In it, you will find great recipes for Cherry Good Oatmeal, Tart Cherry Recovery Gummies, Cherry Chocolate Chip Protein Bites, Cherry Revitalizer Smoothie, and Tart Cherry Mango Avocado Salad.

The wonderful versatility of our fruit is on full display in that recipe book. Let us know if you use any of these recipes in your #runrecoverrepeat routine.

To your health!

 

7 Day Cherry Challenge

Elite athletes, weekend warriors, and regular Joe’s are finding muscle recovery and health benefits from drinking tart cherry juice.  In previous blog posts, we’ve shown you the sleep benefits of tart cherry juice and the muscle recovery benefits of tart cherry juice.

Hopefully by now, you’ve tried our concentrate or cherry capsules for yourself.  If you haven’t, now is the time!  Our industry partners at www.choosecherries.com have started a 7 day tart cherry challenge.  You can learn more about it by clicking this link, which contains incredible resources, recipes, and tips on how to consume the benefits of tart cherries.

We are convinced that if you drink tart cherry juice or pop a couple of our cherry capsules twice a day, you will start to feel the benefits of our wonderful super fruit within 7 days!

So give the 7 day tart cherry challenge a try.  Let us know how it is going for you by leaving a comment below, or using the hashtag #runrecoverrepeat on your social media channels.

#runrecoverrepeat fitness contest

Leelanau Fruit Company tart cherry concentrate and cherry Plus capsules are fast becoming a favorite training aid for fitness enthusiasts and runners alike.  We’ve had a long winter in Northern Michigan, so to celebrate spring, we invite you to join our #runrecoverrepeat fitness community on Instagram and Facebook.

Every time you use the hashtag #runrecoverrepeat, you will enter to win a Leelanau Fruit fitness package that includes a performance tee shirt, hat, and all the cherry products you’ll need to #runrecoverrepeat all summer long!  The more posts you use #runrecoverrepeat on, the more times you’ll be entered to win.

So, after your next run, post a picture of your recovery tart cherry juice drink.  Add the hashtag #runrecoverrepeat.

Are you a morning runner? Show us a pic of a beautiful sunrise on your run with #runrecoverrepeat.

Love running with your dog?  A pic with your pooch and #runrecoverrepeat- you are entered to win!  The possibilities are endless.

This community and contest isn’t limited to runners though.  Do you love our concentrate for other reasons?  Did you just have a great night’s sleep after drinking tart cherry concentrate the night before?  Post your status or picture with #runrecoverrepeat and you’ll be entered to win too!

Don’t forget to stock up on our cherry concentrate and capsules for the your training. We will choose a random winner of the hashtag contest on May 27, the day before many of us run the Bayshore Marathon.  The winner will receive his or her LFC fitness package in time to train for and sign up for the National Cherry Festival of Races.

Tell us below in the comment section what races you are training for this summer.  We’d love to connect with you at some great Northern Michigan events this year!

#runrecoverrepeat and you’ll be in the best shape of your life!

Sleepy from Daylight Savings Time? Try tart cherries!

Many people have a love-hate relationship with daylight savings time. They love having more daylight early in the morning, but they hate the way the time change affects their sleep patterns. It’s an insomniac’s worst nightmare, to say the least. Fortunately, many people who have difficulty sleeping are able to overcome the problem with the help of cannabis, where they are able to order concentrates by mail, or by visiting an online or physical dispensary in order to obtain the cannabis-infused products they need to improve their sleeping patterns. Over the years, this idea has seemingly grown in popularity and many are now using it to help combat any physical or mental ailments they may be suffering from. Of course, knowing a thing or two about the bong vs bubbler debate would be helpful for a first-time novice in this area.

Research has shown that daily consumption of tart cherry concentrate about 90 minutes before you go to bed delivers natural melatonin to your body. Tart cherries are a rare food that contains melatonin, and this melatonin helps your body regulate sleep.

The research behind tart cherries amazing ability to help regulate good sleep can be found here:

http://www.choosecherries.com/press-material/study-tart-cherry-juice-increases-sleep-time-in-adults-with-insomnia/

To see a few great clips of the Dr. Oz show and his investigation into tart cherries ability to help us sleep can be found here:

http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/tart-cherry-all-natural-sleep-aid-pt-1

http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/tart-cherry-all-natural-sleep-aid-pt-2

Our families sleep routine includes taking two Leelanau Fruit Co. Montmorency Cherry Plus Tart Cherry Capsules an hour and a half before we go to bed. We sleep great and wake up refreshed.

Our Montmorency Tart Cherry Concentrate is also a great way to get your nighttime dose of cherry goodness. The sweet-tart flavor is also great to quench that late-night sweet tooth.

Melatonin can be a great natural way to help you get to sleep when the hours get mixed up. It can also help in general if you suffer from insomnia. Though you may want to explore other options as well, such as looking on websites like https://felixgray.com/sleepglasses for resources to aid in restful sleep. Something as simple as changing your mattress can help induce a good night’s sleep, believe it or not. Some mattress sellers occasionally offer 1-2 month trials (here’s a place to find these kinds of offers: https://www.raise.com/coupons/saatva) so you can always try before you buy if you’re ever unsure. Another way to try and get a better night’s sleep is simply to avoid any kind of electronic or bright light before bed as they can trick you into thinking it’s still daytime. So don’t bring that smartphone to bed, you can check Twitter in the morning.

Let us know how our tart cherry products or other sleeping tips are helping you sleep by commenting below. Happy Daylight Savings Time!

What do you guys do this time of year?

“What do you guys do this time of year?” This is a common question we get after cherry season has wrapped up. It is a fair question. Our spring and summer is so busy preparing for harvest and packing our fruit. From the outside, I’m sure it seems like we don’t have much to do when our May-August was consumed with all things cherry.

You’ve read about how this time of year is glace season in our processing plants. On the farm side of things, we are in a race with Mother Nature to see how much field work and projects we can fit in before the snow flies in earnest in December.

Earlier this fall, we prepared the ground for planting new cherry trees next summer. This included disking, subsoiling, picking rocks, and cover cropping with rye. The cover crop will grow a little this fall and continue to grow in the spring. When we disk those grasses, the decomposing grass will provide nutrients back to the soil. Farming can be quite arduous if you’re not used to it. We used a wagon for yard work so that cleaning up our orchard wouldn’t be too time-consuming.

Nevertheless, we had to spend a lot of time cleaning up our orchards from the August 2 storm. Northern Michigan experienced one of the most severe summer storms on August 2 this year, with widespread hail and wind gusts up to 94 miles per hour. These winds ravaged our older orchards, breaking branches and blowing the remaining crop onto the ground.

Our farm work crews have also mowed and fertilized all our orchards. Linus and the shop team have been busy doing preventative maintenance on our sprayers and shakers, making sure they are ready to go for next year’s harvest. We painted one set of our shakers- what a job that was!

We’ve rebuilt several roads around our orchards. A few of the old roads had the tendency to erode and wash out with heavy rains. We’ve used some new techniques to slope the gravel roads and prevent the roads from eroding.

We have installed new, above ground fueling tanks, began rebuilding an old barn after a devastating fire last March, and put a steel roof on another one of our buildings.

So, as you can see, we’ve been busy. Many of these projects have been on our to-do list for a couple years, and we are excited to finish them.

A Fall Festival Celebrating… Maraschino Cherries?

PetersGroupPic

The second weekend of October may have been the nicest fall weekend Northern Michigan has experienced in years. Blue skies, bright sunshine, and 70 degree temps encouraged people to get outside and celebrate fall. Apples, pumpkins, wine, color tours. Fall festival season was in full swing.

 

That Saturday, the team at Leelanau Fruit Company put on our own Fall Festival of sorts. We were honored to open our Buckley plant to US Senator Gary Peters. Senator Peters is in his first term in the Senate, and he has spent significant time in the Traverse City area getting to know our communities, our people, and our businesses.

 

We invited several local businesspeople to share their stories and meet Mr. Peters. We served a lunch that revolved around cherries and the businesses we partner with. Pleva International grilled their signature cherry-blended Plevalean burgers. We served Great Lakes Potato Chip Company’s Cherry Barbecue chip, which is made with real cherries! Our beverage of choice was cherry juice, mixed with our own cherry concentrate. Dessert was Moomer’s Cherries Moobilee ice cream, which features our ice cream cherries, topped with one of our stem-on cocktail cherries.

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I’ve had many chances to work with legislators on many issues. I’ve always felt it’s best to reinforce the message with a personal story. We reinforced our message with food. How can it get any better than that!

 

This meeting was a great opportunity for us as industry leaders to give Senator Peters some background on the complexities of the cherry industry. We highlighted some ways we believe we can grow the industry, strengthening Michigan’s farms and value-added processors. Senator Peters asked thoughtful questions and is excited to support the industry in those goals.

 

We toured the plant, showing the Senator and other guests our processes. We talked about our 150 kW solar array, how that installation allowed us to control some of our high energy costs. And of course, we gave the Senator a piece of fruitcake, featuring our fruit mix, on a to-go plate!

Groupbytanks

Our team at LFC enjoyed hosting the tour. We are passionate about the cherry industry and are proud of our place in it. For us, it is fun to share that passion and excitement with policy makers, local businesspeople, and the community.

talkingtopeters

A local’s top 10 reasons why M-22 is the best road for color tours

m-22

The road in front of our Suttons Bay plant is M-22. This stretch of two-lane highway is renown for its beauty, as it twists along the coast of Leelanau County. Recently, the USA Today and 10Best ranked M-22 as the nation’s most scenic autumn drive. Check it out here (http://www.freep.com/story/travel/michigan/2015/10/05/m-22-voted-americas-best-scenic-autumn-drive/72970232/). Once again, Leelanau County tops a list of the most beautiful places in the country.

As local county residents, we love the fact that so many people want to enjoy their vacation in our backyard. Yes, the traffic gets bad, and it’s challenging to get around our sleepy little towns sometimes. But we love to share our county with others. We are proud of it.

And so, with the peak color season coming somewhere between October 10 and the 25, we’d like to share with you our top 10 reasons why M-22 is the best road for color tours.

  1. Water. You are surrounded by it while driving. It’s beautiful. It’s fresh. And it provides a background to all the memories you’ll make while driving around Leelanau County.
  1. No stoplights. Once you enter LC, you will not encounter another 3-light stop light until you leave LC. Life is slower here (unless you work and live here, then you hustle like crazy. Summer only lasts a minute or two).
  1. Orchards are everywhere. And as a company who relies on those orchards, we couldn’t be happier.
  1. Wineries, cider houses, and breweries. Around every twist of M-22, you are bound to run into a great winery, cider house, or brewery crafting award-winning beverages. Try Good Harbor Vineyards, one of our favorites.
  1. Fishtown. Spend some time in Leland’s historic fishing village. The shops and galleries are one of a kind, as is the location.
  1. The Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. Hike the dune climb, explore Pyramid Point, or search for Petoskey stones at Glen Haven. It’s the best. You won’t want to leave.
  1. Go off the beaten path. While everyone else will be driving M-22, explore LC like a local. Go to Cedar and have a Polish Dog. Eat some Indian Food at NJ’s in Lake Leelanau. Drive the back roads in Maple City, taking in some of the best views you’ll ever see.
  1. M-22 towns. Suttons Bay, Omena, Northport, Leland, Glen Arbor, and Empire. If they don’t have it, you don’t need it.
  1. Good Harbor. Go there for a sunset. Preferably when there are a few clouds in the western sky. It is incredible.
  1. Stop into Leelanau Fruit and buy some fruit products like a local! Fill up on all your Leelanau County souveniers like cherry concentrate, dried cherries, chocolate covered cherries, and Leelanau Fruit swag. And mention you read about us on our blog for a freebie!

 

The Best Cherry Pie Ever!

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TART CHERRY PIE
Plump and juicy cherries are one of summer’s favorite fruits. There’s no better way to take advantage of the bounty than to bake up a homemade cherry pie!  We’d love to have you stop by our Suttons Bay office and meet our resident recipe expert, Misha.  While you are there, make sure you pick up plenty of frozen tart cherries to make your pies with!

Ingredients:
1 ¼ cups sugar
2 tablespoons cornstarch
¼ teaspoon Almond extract
Dash salt
4 cups fresh or frozen pitted tart cherries, thawed and drained
Pastry for double crust 9” pie (recipe to follow)
2 tablespoons butter, cut into small pieces
1 egg yolk, sugar to sprinkle over the top crust
Directions:
In a large saucepan, combine the sugar, cornstarch, salt; stir in cherries and extract until blended. Let stand for 30 minutes. Bring to a boil over medium heat; cook and stir for 2 minutes or until thickened. Remove from the heat.
Line a 9 inch pie plate with bottom crust. Fill with cherry filling; dot with butter. Top with remaining top crust. (you may wish to cut out some pretty cherry shapes and leaves before placing the crust on top of the cherry filling). Trim, seal and flute edges. Cut a few slits in the top crust for steam to escape while baking. Wisk egg yolk and brush over top crust. Sprinkle with sugar. Bake in a pre-heated 375 degree oven for 45 minutes or until crust is golden brown and filling is bubbly. Cover edges during the last 20 minutes to prevent over-browning. Cool on wire rack.

PERFECT PIE CRUST (for a 9”, two crust pie)
Ingredients:
2 ½ all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
¾ cup cold butter, cut into chunks
¼ cup cold lard or shortening
¼ cold water
Directions:
Mix flour, salt & sugar in large mixing bowl or food processor. Add butter & lard and cut into the flour mixture using pastry cutter or pulsing food processor. The mixture should look like large crumbs and begin to cling together. Do not overmix. Sprinkle water over the dough and with hands mix until dough holds together. Shape into 2 discs. Wrap with plastic wrap and keep refrigerated until ready to use.

CANNED CHERRY PIE FILLING
It’s always helpful to have canned pie filling on hand to whip up a quick dessert. What could be better than to make up a batch of your own homemade to have on hand!
Ingredients:
12 cups (6 pounds) frozen pitted red tart cherries, thawed in the refrigerator
3 cups sugar
9 tablespoons cornstarch
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon almond extract
3 cups cherry juice (from draining thawed cherries) If not enough juice add water to make three cups
6 (16oz) pint glass preserving jars with lids and bands
Directions:
Place cherries in strainer set over a bowl to collect the juice.
Whisk sugar, cornstarch and salt together in a saucepan until blended. Combine cherry juice and water and slowly wisk into the sugar mixture. Place pan over medium heat and heat to boiling, whisking constantly until very thick. Remove from heat and stir in extract and cherries.
Ladle hot cherry pie filling into jars leaving 1 inch headspace. Remove air bubbles. Wipe rim, top with lid and band and adjust until fit is fingertip tight.
Process filled jars in boiling water canner for 35 minutes. Remove jars and cool. Check lids for seal after 24 hours.