Yes, We Probably Should Just Buy a Blender

Seattlest has never been in Stand By Me. If we were corralled by a prepubescent hiking companion and asked what one food we'd want to eat for the rest of our lives, it would not be cherry flavor Pez. Nope. We'd pick smoothies.

We used to be big fans of the local Juice Plant chain -- especially the Boys of Summer -- but when they went out of business, we became regular patrons of San Francisco megajuice chain Jamba Juice. (Our usual: Cranberry Craze with no raspberry sherbet, sub lime sherbet. But we're also big fans of the seasonal Orange Cherry Cheer other-seasonal lime varieties.)

Yes, we know there's still a Juice Plant on Third Avenue. We're hardly ever downtown when it's open, though. Since we spend most of our workday closer to downtown Renton, we've been known to stop by Emerald City Smoothie. But frankly, we're turned off (okay, intimidated) by their rampant display of fitness porn, and we find that their smoothies taste more like fruit shakes than actual smoothies. When we do stop in, we usually get the Zesty Lemon.

Many other local "smoothies" are really just fruit-syrup granitas, which neither taste all that good or make us feel all that healthy.