Our homemade fresh cherry limeade is simple to make and it’s a cool and delicious recipe to add to your summer drink rotation. This classic sweet and tangy limeade only uses 3 ingredients and it’s easy to make.
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One of the best summer flavor combinations is cherry and lime, and our cherry limeade is a delicious way to cool down in the summer heat. It’s homemade with fresh fruit, is easy to make, and the color is natural (no artificial colors added).
The way we make this limeade is very similar to our lemonade recipes except we don’t cook the lime slices with the lime juice, unlike our lemonade where we add some lemon oil into the lemonade with whole lemon slices.
Why you’ll love this recipe
If you’re looking for simple yet delicious drink recipes to add to your summer recipe list, our cherry limeade is perfect since it’s made with just 3 simple ingredients, 2 of which are seasonal summer fruits.
Since we don’t simmer the lime peel with the juice like we do with our lemonades, this limeade is even faster to make as well, and it’s ready to serve immediately once it’s made, you don’t have to wait several hours for it to chill.
How to make fresh cherry limeade
This recipe is pretty easy to make with just a few simple ingredients. Here are the steps to make this recipe (this is just an overview, the full recipe card is at the end of the post):
- Wash your limes, cut them in half, and juice them (this will take about 2 pounds of fresh Persian limes). Strain any seeds from the juice and measure out 1 ¼ cups of fresh lime juice and add it to a 2-quart saucepan.
- Add 1 cup of water and the sugar to the saucepan with the lime juice and heat over medium heat.
- Bring to a simmer, then reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer for 5 minutes to fully dissolve the sugar.
- Remove from the heat and set aside.
- Add 1 quart of ice to a 2-quart pitcher.
- Wash and pit your fresh sweet cherries, then add the pitted cherries to a small blender with 1 cup of water.
- Process the cherries and water for about 30 seconds to make a cherry “juice”. Pour the cherry juice through a strainer into the pitcher of ice.
- Add the lime juice and sugar mixture to the pitcher with ice and stir to combine.
- Add enough cold water to the pitcher to fill it to the 2-quart line.
- You can serve this immediately if you want since it will already be cold thanks to the ice, or you can put it in the fridge for later. If chilling for later, make sure to stir before serving.
Tips for making our limeade
For the best tasting limeade, I used regular store limes (aka Persian/seedless/Bearss/Tahiti limes) in this recipe vs other kinds of limes (such as key limes) since Persian limes tend to be less bitter than key limes.
Since this recipe uses pureed cherries, it can end up slightly cloudy, so I usually strain this twice. I strain the cherry juice right after blending it as I list in the instructions, and then once everything is mixed, I pour the limeade through a fine mesh tea strainer to filter out a little bit more of the cherry solids that might still be in the limeade.
This works beautifully for our cherry limeade and reduces the sediment and cloudiness, though it doesn’t get rid of it completely, so you’ll still want to give this a good stir before serving.
Can I use frozen cherries in this recipe?
You can use frozen sweet cherries in this recipe if you don’t have fresh sweet cherries. You’ll just want to thaw the frozen cherries first then follow the rest of the recipe like you would with fresh cherries.
Can I make this limeade lower in sugar?
If you’d like to lower the amount of sugar in this recipe, you can try replacing all or some of the sugar with a granulated sweetener, such as granulated allulose or erythritol.
I have not tried replacing the sugar in our recipe yet, but since this is not a technical recipe requiring real sugar (such as caramel), replacing some or all the sugar in this recipe should be pretty easy to do. You may just need to adjust the amount of sugar substitute to suit your tastes if needed.
Sparkling limeade option: I recently got a Sparkel soda machine for my birthday and we used it to add bubbles to this recipe for sparkling cherry limeade! The Sparkel machine can carbonate drinks besides water, so it works perfectly on our lemonades and limeades.
Check out our lemonade recipes, including guava lemonade, peach lemonade, and more!
Homemade Fresh Cherry Limeade
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups unbleached sugar (I use Zulka natural cane sugar)
- 1 ¼ cups fresh squeezed lime juice (about 2 pounds of Persian limes)
- 2 cups water, divided
- 1 ½ cups fresh pitted sweet cherries
- 4 cups ice cubes
Equipment
Instructions
- Wash your limes, cut them in half, and juice them (this will take about 2 pounds of fresh Persian limes). Strain the lime juice and measure out 1 ¼ cups of juice and add it to a 2-quart saucepan.
- Add 1 cup of water and the sugar to the saucepan with the lime juice, whisk, and heat over medium heat.
- Bring to a simmer, then reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer for 5 minutes to fully dissolve the sugar.
- Remove from the heat and set aside.
- Add 1 quart of ice to a 2-quart pitcher.
- Wash and pit your fresh sweet cherries, then add the pitted cherries to a small blender with 1 cup of water.
- Process the cherries and water for about 30 seconds to make a cherry “juice”. Pour the cherry juice through a strainer into the pitcher of ice.
- Add the lime juice and sugar mixture to the pitcher with ice and stir to combine.
- Add enough cold water to the pitcher to fill it to the 2-quart line.
- You can serve this immediately if you want since it will already be cold thanks to the ice, or you can put it in the fridge for later. If chilling for later, make sure to stir before serving.
Notes
Nutrition
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Sarah Jane Parker is the founder, recipe creator, and photographer behind The Fit Cookie which she founded in 2011. Sarah is based in Wyoming and has been managing food allergies for herself and her 2 children for over 20 years. Sarah was also a certified personal trainer for 12 years, as well as a group fitness instructor, health coach, running coach, and fitness nutrition specialist.
Very good!
Thank you!