Cherry Facts - Information on Cherries and Cherry Trees
The following compilation of cherry facts may help you to determine not only which cherries are considered to be the most beneficial to your health, but also which groups of cherries might be the easiest for a novice to raise. One of the least known cherry facts is in regard to the sweet cherry, which has the least amount of calories when eaten raw. Because cherries tend to be a seasonal fruit, and are sometimes not at their peak when shipped to our local market, we tend to reach for alternatives without much concern for what might be adding to those frozen cherries. Why should we feel worried about buying fruit? It’s not like we’re buying chocolate. It’s certainly not as if we want to dip our cherries in chocolate. But what if the syrups and sugars that were packed with your frozen cherries made them worse for than if you had drenched them in chocolate?
Our next set of cherry facts: buyer beware. Most cherry products on the shelf in your grocery store or deli market are absolutely loaded with sugar. A 1 cup serving of raw sweet cherries has just 71 calories. This same cup of frozen, sweetened cherries packs a walloping 266 calories. I don’t know about you, but I would just as soon eat a chocolate bar with my fresh cherries as to ingest pure sugar where it isn’t even necessary. One cup of raw tart cherries has just 78 calories, which is surprisingly slightly higher than the calorie count of our sweet cherries, but still a great alternative to packaged, sweetened cherries.
And now, maybe we should cover some cherry facts about trees and bushes. Yes, there are cherry bushes, wonderful ones, and we’ll get back to them in just a minute. There are literally hundreds of varieties of cherry trees available at nurseries and home improvement stores across the country, but knowing which ones will work for you is the trick.
If you are seeking a cherry tree strictly for ornamental purposes, there are many weeping, Japanese, and dwarf cherry trees to choose from. Each has its own strengths and weaknesses, but most have been cross bred to bring out the hardy, blossom abundant trees that we have come to love so much.
We can not finish talking cherry facts until the matter of the incredible cherry bush is brought to light. In the 1940’s, a gardener decided that he would cross a pie cherry tree with a Mongolian cherry tree, in attempts to create not only a new texture and flavor of cherry, but to birth a hardier and more adaptable cherry tree. Since those early days of cross breeding, a vast assortment of cherry bushes, who max out at 4 to 6 feet tall, have been created. They produce every type of cherry one could wish for, yet require hardly any maintenance or waiting time.