Summary: Leslie Bonci talks about sour cherries, or tart cherries.<br> <br> Host: Gloria Tsang, RD<br> Guest: Leslie Bonci, RD, MPH, LDN<br> <br> The best part of summer is the tasting the abundance of sweet and juicy fruit. But sometimes, sour can be good too! Welcome to the Nutrition Tidbits podcast. Leslie Bonci is here to talk about sour cherries, or tart cherries. She is the director of sports nutrition for the Center for Sports Medicine at the UPMC University of Pittsburgh Medical Centre.<br> <br> <br> <br> <br> Transcript:<br> Gloria Tsang, RD: The best part of summer is tasting the abundance of sweet and juicy fruits. But sometimes, sour can be good too! Welcome to the Nutrition Tidbits podcast. This is Gloria Tsang, editor-in-chief for HealthCastle.com. I have sports dietitian Leslie Bonci with me today to talk about sour cherries, or tart cherries. She is the director of sports nutrition for the Center for Sports Medicine at the UPMC University of Pittsburgh Medical Centre. Thank you for joining me, Leslie.<br> <br> Leslie Bonci, RD, MPH, LDN: Well thanks for hwaving me.<br> <br> Gloria Tsang, RD: Let's get to the bottom line. Why should we try tart cherries?<br> <br> Leslie Bonci, RD, MPH, LDN: Well, there is a lot of health benefits to tart cherries. Number one, it's a fruit and that is always a good thing. Number two, tart cherries are very concentrated in a substance called anthocyanins. Those are actually the chemicals in tart cherries that give them the beautiful, beautiful color that they have. And those chemicals do a lot of things. Number one, they are anti-inflammatory. Well that's important we want people to be out and doing physical activity. And if people are hurt, they probably are not going to be as active so it may indeed help them prevent some of that inflammation. Number two, tart cherries can also lower uric acid levels. That means for people who have gout, they may not have as many symptoms associated with gout. Number three tart cherries make also work very similarly by helping to decrease the metabolic syndrome, lowering blood glucose, lowering blood pressure, lowering blood cholesterol and keeping our bodies healthy. So there is a lot of health benefits from this wonderful little fruit.<br> <br> Gloria Tsang, RD: You mention gout and that really interests me. You know with gout nutrition, we often talk about what not to eat. This is exciting to know that this is something we can actually eat and help. So what does the science say in terms of how much tart cherries we should eat in order to prevent the flair up of gout?<br> <br> Leslie Bonci, RD, MPH, LDN: Exactly. Really what the studies are saying is probably looking at about either a handful of a tart cherry, whether it is a dried tart cherry or using the frozen ones, in something because they are a little tart to have by themselves; or having an eight ounce glass of juice. Any of those would work well. And the other thing that is a benefit and very unique to the tart cherry is that tart cherries are a significant source of melatonin which also may help regulate sleep. So truly, we have got a head to toe benefit associated with tart cherries.<br> <br> Gloria Tsang, RD: I have heard that you helped develop the red recovery routine. What exactly is that?<br> <br> Leslie Bonci, RD, MPH, LDN: The reason that I have done that is because I work with athletes all the time, some professional and some recreational athletes. When people think about what they are doing for their sport, often time they just go and do their sport. And they don't concentrate what they are doing after they are done so they can do it again the next day. Primarily, incorporating the tart cherry juice into the equation to help somebody prevent some of the inflammation, so indeed they can get back to running, or biking or any of those types of things. So when we look at recovery, recovery is that ideally,
